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ENCYCLOPEDIA 



OF 



Genealogy and Biography 



OF 



LAKE COUNTY, INDIANA, 

WITH A COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY 
1834— J904 



A Record of the Achievements of Its People in the Making of a 
Commonwealth and the Founding of a Nation. 



REV. T. H. BALL 

OF CROWN POINT, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF 



ILLUSTRATED 



CHICAGO NEW YORK 

THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY 

1904 



INDEX. 



A 



Ackerman, William W 395 

Adams, James 9S 

Address to Children 45 

Agnew, David ig 

A Golden Wedding 156 

Ainsworth Made a Station 34 

Allman, Amos 296 

Allman, Mary 298 

Allman, Walter L 205 

Ames, Samuel 122 

An Old Landmark 154 

Artesian Wells 49 

Artesian Well at Crown Point 37 

Asche, Henry 614 

Atkinson, David C 229 

Ausley, Robert 543 

A West Creek Settlement 12 

Ayers, Alexander E 493 



B 



Babbitt, W. S 60 

Bacon, E. R 528 

Bader, Callus J 216 

Bailey, Charley T 512 

Bailey, George B 498 

Bailey, Josiah B 526 

Bailey, Levi E igi> 

Baker, Charles M 263 

Ball, Amsi L 107 

Ball, Charles 57 

Ball, Hervey 69 

Ball, James H 576 

Ball, John 107 

Ball, T. H 667 

Banks, N. P 388 

Baptist Organization 11 

Barker, Louis 555 

Barr, Herbert S 213 

Barrett, Edward F 649 

Batterman, Edward 382 

Batterman, Henry C 331 

Batterman, Herman A 621 

Bauer, Carl E 299 

Beattie, Joseph A 320 

Beckman, Herman C log 

Beckman, John N S92 

Bell, Benjamin L. P 484 

Bell, Samuel A 655 

Belman, William C 454 

Belshaw, George 77 

Belshaw, Henry 77 

Belshaw, William 77 



Belshaw, William E 368 

Berg, Joseph B 40S 

Biggs, Mrs. T. Norton 552 

Black, John i8c 

Blakeman, John 179 

Bliss, M. G 102 

Bohling, John G 194 

Borger, Charles A 418 

Borger, John H 626 

Borman, Otto C 524 

Bothwell, Charles C 271 

Boyd, Eli M 317 

Boyd, George 401 

Bradford, James M 176 

Brandenburg, Elmer D 656 

Brandenburg, Oliver C 657 

Brandt, Henry 421 

Brannon, Amos 442 

Brannon, James 360 

Brennan, John J 192 

Brick Blocks at Crown Point 32 

Bridge, William F 278 

Bridges Across the Kankakee 37 

Brown, Alexander F m 

Brown, George 112 

Brown, John 168 

Brown, Mathew J 202 

Brownell, F. E 605 

Bryant, David 118 

Bryant, Elias 119 

Bryant, E. Wayne 119 

Bryant, John 392 

Bryant, Samuel D 119 

Bryant, Simeon 119 

Buckley, Fred W 595 

Buckley, William 521 

Buczkowski, John i8g 

Buse, Fred T 524 

Butler Cabins of 1834 i 

Business Men of Crown Point 27 



Campbell, Cyrus W 658 

Capturing Timber Thieves 7 

Carlin, Bernard F... 529 

Castle. Fred 352 

Castle, George L 435 

Cedar Lake Incidents 162 

Chartier, Fred S 567 

Cheney, Byron M 595 

Chester. Henry 280 

Children at World's Fair 40 

Chipman, A. B 451 

Church, Richard 81 



INDEX. 



Churches, School Houses, Banks 48 

Claims Made in 1834 2 

Clark, Alexander 89 

Clark, Judge 88 

Clark, Sanford D 117 

Clark, Thomas 89 

Clark, Wellington A 538 

Cleveland, Ephraim 103 

Cleveland, Timothy 103 

Cochran, Henry 175 

Cochran, William 174 

Conrad, August 356 

Conroy, Joseph H 501 

County Officers of 1847 17 

County Organized 6 

County Purchased from Indians i 

County Seat, Efforts to Remove 39 

County Seat Location 13 

County Set Off from Porter 4 

County Surveyed i 

Cox, Arthur T 324 

Cox, Lawrence 215 

Creston Made a Station 35 

Crown Point Telephone Co 41 

Crumpacker, Peter 662 



D 



Dickinson, William T 485 

Dinwiddie, John W 73 

Dinwiddie, Oscar 568 

Doescher, Herman 86 

D wyer, John 437 

E 

Earle, George 64 

Early Mail Routes 9 

Early Railroad Stations 27 

Early Religious Meetings 8 

Early Sawmills 9 

East Chicago Commenced 38 

Eddy. Russell 91 

Eder, George M 267 

Edgerton, Alfred 124 

Edgerton, Amos 124 

Edgerton, George W 57 

Edgerton, Horace 124 

Ege, Francis X 664 

Einsele, Sebastian 607 

Einspahr, Frederick H 411 

Einspahr, Mrs. Katharina 420 

Electric Lights at Crown Point 39 

Electric Railway at Hammond 41 

Exploring Parties in 1834 2 

F 

Fancher, Reuben 461 

Fancher, Richard 90 

Fancher, Thaddeus S 362 

Farley, Benjamin 116 

Farrineton. Dr 99 

Farwell, Major C 92 



Fieler, Christian 183 

Fiester, John L 349 

First Bridges Built 10 

First Census of the County 14 

First Church Buildings 15 

First Court House (Log) 8 

First Justice of the Peace 5 

First Meeting of Commissioners 6 

First Minister at Crown Point 15 

First Postoffice 6 

First Railroad Through Crown Point. 29 

First Regular Physician 8 

First Resident Methodist Minister 15 

First Store 6 

First Term of Circuit Court 7 

First Townships 5 

Fisher, David A 254 

Fisher, John 220 

Fisher, John ^ in 

Fisher, Thomas in 

Foster, Albert 425 

Foster, John M 59 

Foster, William M 353 

Fowler, Luman A 91 

Franz, Balzer 222 

Friedrich, Charles A 292 

Fricdrich, Charles W 223 

Fry. Alfred 58 

Frysinger, Miles C 45S 

Fuller, James 125 

Fuller, Richard 197 



G 



Gavit, Frank A 616 

Gavit, John A 559 

Gerlach, Adam J 283 

Gerlach, George F 327 

Gerrish, Abiel 121 

Gibson, Charles C 431 

Gilbert, Edwin S 541 

Gill, James A 572 

Glover, William J 328 

Golden Wedding, A 156 

Grant, Thomas 424 

Gravel and Rock Roads 42 

Gravel Road Through Hobart 41 

Graves, M 58 

Greene, Joseph 98 

Greenwald, Charles E 237 

Griffin, Charles F 98 

Griffin, Elihu 97 

Griffith Becoming a Town 40 

Griffith, David D 346 

Griffith Made a Station 34 

Grimmer, Michael 193 

Gromann, Charles 589 

Growth at Tolleston 28 

Growth of Lowell 30 

Growth up to 1847 16 

Gruel, Charles 383 

Guyer, E. H 650 

Guyer, James 399 



INDEX. 



H 



Hack, John 83 

Hack, Mrs. Angelina 84 

Haie, William F 172 

Half man, William 654 

Halls Opened 2,2 

Halsted, James M 291 

Halsted, Melvin A 560 

Hammond in 1894 41 

Hammond, Superior Court 41 

Hammond, Walter H 212 

Harrison, Elizabeth 500 

Hart, A. N 8,V5S2 

Hathaway, Mahlon 440 

Hathaway, Peter 116 

Hayden, Albert L 519 

Hayden. Cyrus 481 

Hayden. Edgar 496 

Hayden, Jacob 516 

Hayden, John K 459 

Hayden, Joseph 497 

Hayden, Lewis 52J 

Hayden, Nehemiah 116 

Hayden, William N 468 

Hayes, Benjamin F S50 

Hayhurst, Eldon N 517 

Hayward, Charles 113 

Hay ward, Thomas 113 

Hayward, Warren H 574 

Herlitz, Lewis 86 

Herlitz, Louis W 628 

Hershman, William H 557 

Hess, Frank 242 

Higgins, Jolm 100 

Higgins, John 344 

Highland Made a Station 35 

Hill, James 96 

Hill, Rufus 120 

Hillman, John 359 

Hipsley, Reuben 248 

Hobart, Founding and Growth of 28 

Hobart Public Schools 404 

Holmes, Charles J 597 

Holton, J. W 89 

Holton, W. A, W 90 

Hornor, Amos 105 

Hornecker. George M 240 

Hoskins, George H 184 

Huber, Albert C s8S 

Humphrey, Augustine 126 

Hunting Wild Hogs 160 

Hurlburt, Jacob 79 

Hutton, Levi 211 



Ibach, Benjamin F 563 

Iddings, H. L 319 

Indiana City Named 5 

Indiana Harbor 43 

Irish, J. Floyd 569 



J 

Jackson, Joseph 115 

Jackson, L. D 659 

Johnson, Charles A 304 

Jones, David 107 

Jones, George W 284 

Jones, Herbert E 256 

Jones, J. D 77 

Jones, Levi D 107 

K 

Kammer, Andrew 282 

Keilman, Henry L 335 

Keilman, John L 191 

Keilman, Leonard 250 

Keilmann, Charles 249 

Keilmann, Francis P 233 

Kelly, P. J 463 

Kelsey, James J 414 

Kenney, Jerry M 208 

Kimmet, John A 507 

Kitchel, John n6 

Klaas, Henry A 635 

Knotts, Armanis F 571 

Koehle, August 255 

Kolb, Michael 638 

Kopelke, Johannes 225 

Kozacik, Michael 316 

Krinbill, Oscar A 661 

Krost, John 87 

Krudup, John 591 

L 

Lake County Crow Roosts 152 

Lake County's Semi-centennial 35 

Land Sale 12 

Landmark, An Old 154 

Landscapes 150 

Large Land Holders S3 

Larson, Louis 423 

Lash, Frederick 258 

Lauerman, Mathias M 618 

LeRoy 29 

Little, James H 467 

Little, Jesse 472 

Little, Joseph A 121 

Little, Lewis G 5M 

Liverpool Made a Town 5 

Livingston, Robert no 

Livingston, Samuel 1 10 

Log Court House Built ' 8 

Love, James H 536 

Love, John E 49i 

Love, Samuel A 534 

Luther, James H 94 

Luther, John E 276 

Lynch, Daniel 504 

Lyons, Frank H 637 

M 

Mandernach, Frederick W 623 

Marvin, Charles 114 



INDEX.' 



Marvin, Mrs. Eliza L 386 

Mason, Cyrus M 79 

McAleer, William J 343 

McCarty, Benjamin 65 

McCarty, Miles F 57 

McDonald, Alexander 102 

McGlashon, W. G 108 

McKnight, David 127 

McMahan, W. C 288 

Meeker, Charles H 239 

Meeker, Hiram H 232 

Meeker, J. Frank 236 

Meeker, Nathan B 301 

Meikle, Hugh F 206 

Merrill, Dudley 78 

Merrill, John P 60 

Merrill. William 78 

Metcalf, Ozro 544 

Methodist Organization 11 

Meyer, John H 610 

Meyer, LeGrand T 599 

Meyer, Mrs. Johanna 456 

Meyers, Stephen 432 

Mexican War Company 17 

Michael, Edwin 375 

Michael. William H 47S 

Miller, H. F. C 506 

Miller, Samuel 119 

Miller's Station 31 

Morey, Mrs. Susann 397 

Muenich, Gottlieb 334 

Murphey, William C 584 

Muzzall, Edwin J 639 

Muzzall, Thomas 114 

N 

Names of One Hundred and Twenty 

Women 129-142 

Names of Soldiers Who Fell in the 

War 61 

Nelson, F. E 503 

New Brick Blocks in Crown Point.... 34 

Nichols, Charles E 364 

Nichols, Horatio R 366 

Nichols, Mrs. Sarah E 445 

Norwegian, A Young 21 

Number of Families in Crown Point, 

Lowell, Hobart. in 1897 42 

Number of School Children in 1895... 41 

Number of School Children in 1897... 42 

Number of Votes in 1876 34 

Number of Votes in 1884 35 

Number of Votes in 1896 42 

o 

Old Settler and Historical Association. 45 

Our Dead Soldiers at Nashville 58 

Our Soldiers 54 

Owen, W. B 35° 

P 

Palmer, Dennis 336 



Palmer, H. D 66 

Palmer, James 124 

Palmer Made a Station 35 

Pattee, Wesley 371 

Patten. John H 117 

Patterson, James A 332 

Patton, James 295 

Patton, Joseph 246 

Patton, Seymore 294 

Pearce, John 641 

Pearce, Michael 75 

Pearce, Seth L 289 

Peiton, H. S 88 

Pettibone, Harvey 100 

Pettibone. Henry 100 

Pierce, Floyd M 245 

Pierce, Marion F 218 

Pioneer Children and Nature 146 

Pioneer Period, Review of 18 

Pixley, Chester P 470 

Plummer, Abiel G 488 

Plummer, Frank B 487 

Politics of Lake County 29 

Population in 1900 44 

Pratt, A. J 99 

Pre-historic Man 53 

Presbyterian Church Organized 15 

Pulver, David C 532 

R 

Railroad Through Merrillville 44 

Red Cedar Lake 5' 

Reiland, John S 185 

Reilley, Patrick 56S 

Review of Pioneer Period.... 18 

Rhodes, Jonas 113 

Richards, Frank 475 

Rifenburg, William H 494 

Rimbach, Jacob 272 

Robbins, Stillman A 56 

Robinson, Clifford C 642 

Robinson, John G 447 

Robinson, Milo 88 

Robinson, Solon 63 

Rockwell, T. C 81 

Rockwell. W. B 81 

Rockwell, William 81 

Rowins, James F 604 

S 

Sanders, William 127 

Sasse, Henry, Sr 85 

Sasse, Herman E 85 

Sauerman, Andrew A 188 

Sauerman, J. C 86 

Saunders. Gilbert C 643 

Sawyer, Daniel F 60 

Saxton. Ebenezer 75 

Schaaf, F. Richard, Jr 264 

Schaaf, F. Richard, Sr 452 

Schaefer, John P 244 

Schafer, Nickolas 510 



INDEX. 



Scharbach, Frank C 368 

Scharbach, William 367 

Scherer, Nichols 308 

Schmal, Adam 84 

Schmal, Alfred 630 

Schmal. Joseph 84 

School Grove, now Oak Grove, and Its 

Sportsmen 33 

Schrage, Henry 274 

Schrage, Heinrich C 303 

Scoffern, Isaac H 646 

Scritchfield, Hiram H 127 

Seehaiisen, Henry 609 

Servis, Orlando V I99 

Settlers of 1833 3 

Settlers of 1834 and 1835 3 

Settlers of 1836 5 

Settlers of 1837 6 

Sharrer, Harry E 54^ 

Sheerer, George B 181 

Shelby Village Commenced 35 

Sherart, Frank P 3/8 

—Sherman, William 97 

Sickness of 1846. . .^ 16 

Sigler, Samuel 76 

Sigler, William 76 

/'Bniith, Andrew J 384 

Smith, Clarence C 269 

Smith, Cyrus E 323 

Smith, Fred J 200 

Smith, Joseph P 88 

Smith, William C SSi 

ySrnith, William E 347 

Soldiers Enlisting 29 

Soldier's Monument 62 

Soldiers at Nashville, Our Dead 58 

Soldiers, Our 54 

Some Lake County Miscellany 146 

Some Sheep Brought In 14 

Some Sad Occurrences 19 

Some Suggested Pictures 22 

Spear, Robert 266 

Spalding, Heman M 117 

Spalding, N 116 

Spring and Wells of Water 49 

Spry, John 449 

Squatters' Union Organized 5 

Stark, John 401 

Stark, Joseph 581 

State Line Slaughter House 31 

Steam Dredges on the Kankakee Marsh 37 

Stearns, Thomas J 429 

Stephens, Francis E 653 

Stephens, John 260 

Sternberg, Mathias G 647 

Stuppy, Philip 480 

Sturtevant, Daniel B 374 

Summers, Zerah F 108 

Sunderman. Fred L 380 

Suprise, Henry 443 

Sutton, Emerson 464 

Sutton, Festus P 408 

Sutton, Gabriel 466 

S wanson, Albert J 433 



Swartz, Henry P 227 

Sykes, William N ^2 



Tabular View of Railroads 26 

Take, John F 650 

Taylor, Adonijah 124 

Taylor. Albert 124 

Taylor, Charles A 476 

Taylor, DeWitt C 124 

Taylor, Horace 124 

Taylor, Obadiah 124 

Templeton, Charles L 82 

Thiel, John M 234 

Thompson, Alexander C 358 

Thompson, D. H 204 

Thompson, Lyman 97 

Torrey, Henry 116 

Towle, Marcus M 306 

Township Organizations 49 

Traptow, Ernest 407 

Turner, A. M 341 

Turner, David 73 

Turnei . Samuel 72 

Turner, Samuel R 310 



U 



Underwood, John 80 



V 



Valuation of Taxable Property in 1895. 41 

VanDewalker, James G 579 

Van Home, Willard B 178 

VanLoon, D. M 348 

Vansciver. William H 253 

Village and Town Life at Hammond.. 32 

Viimer, W. E lOI 

Voltmer, August 391 

VonHollen, Henry 85 



w 



Wagonblast. Gotf ried W 170 

Walsh. Redmond D 312 

Warriner. Lewis ^0 

Warwick, William E 322 

Wason, H 122 

Wason, T. A 473 

-^Wells, Henry 72 

—Wells, Rodman H 54^ 

West Creek Settlement, A 12 

Wheeler, Harold H.. 252 

Wheeler. John 54 

Wheeler, John J 577 

Wheeler, Oliver G. 601 

Whiting Commenced 39 

Wiggins, Jeremiah 123 



INDEX. 

Wille, H. Ph 339 Y 

Willey, George 123 

Wise, Jacob 125 ,,• r, t> 

Wood, James A 98 Yeoman, SB gg 

Wood, John 67 l°'"'^'='J- W-V,; ^°^ 

Wood! Martin 102 ^ °""g' George W 224 

Wood, Thomas J 632 

Wood, Wilham H 330 Z 

Woods, Bartlett 92 

Worley, John L 127 Zumbuelte, Mathias 612 



HISTORY 



OF 



LAKE COUNTY. 



CHAPTER I. 
Outline History of Lake County, Indiana. From 1834 to 1850. 

Indiana Territory was organized May 7, 1800. 

Indiana was admitted into tlie Union as a State in December, 18 16. 
At that time, and for several years after that date, the northwestern part 
was a true American wild. In 1820 the county of Wabash had an area 
of 8000 sc[uare miles with a population, according to the census, of 147. 
The entire north part of the State, about one-third of its area, had not then 
been purchased from the Indians. .\ very small part of what became Lake 
county was purchased in 1826, the little fractions north of the Ten Mile 
Line, but the main part, it might be said all, of Lake county was purchased 
in 1832. In 1834 file land was laid out liy LTnited States surveyors into 
townships and sections. 

A rumor of the desirableness of this region soon went southward into 
the Wabash Valley and far below the ^\'al)ash River into Jennings county. 
From those older settled parts of the State explorers and persons seeking 
new locations came, and some from the eastward, in the summer and fall 
of 1834. There is evidence that some came from the eastward in the sum- 
mer by the name of Butler, and that claims were made bv them and some 
cabin bodies erected, probably no roofs put on, where is now the town of 



2 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Crown Point : but for some reason these made no settlement tliere then or 
afterward. The log walls were found there by those who came later, but 
who came to stay. 

In September of 1834 a party of fi^■e men came from Attica on the 
Wabash and camped on the bank of the Red Cedar Lake. These were 
Richard Fancher, Charles Wilson, Robert Wilkinson, afterwards known as 
Judge Wilkinson, and with him two nephews. Richard Fancher and Charles 
AVilson were well mounted, the other three men had a wagon and team, 
and these two rode extensively over the central parts of the county. If they 
could ap])reciate nature's beauties those lonely rides must have been delight- 
ful. Lonely, these rides are called, as there were no settlers, no human 
beings to be seen in their explorations, (the Indians were probably then on 
the Calumet and the Kankakee), and these two men had the open prairies, 
the groves, and the woodland to themselves. They had first choice of the 
locations. Richard Fancher selected that little lake, which still bears his 
name, and the land around it. which is now the Lake County Fair Ground. 
Charles Wilson selected his location on the west side of that lake, on the 
shore of whicli was their camping ground, of which mention will hereafter 
be quite fully made. To that same lake in October of 1834 came another 
]iarty from the W'abash, Dr. Thomas Brown, David Hornor, and, probably, 
Thomas Hornor. These men selected locations for settlement, made several 
claims, according to pioneer or squatter usage, and returned to their shel- 
tered homes for the winter. These were the explorers bi what liecame the 
Hornor settlement on the west side of that lake. But settlers as well as claim- 
seekers came in that summer and fall of 1834. 

E.\RLV SETTLERS. 

According to the Ijest authority now accessible, the Iiest, indeed, now 
in existence, the Claim Register, claims were made or locations selected, in 
1834, by the following named persons or for them: in June, William S. 
Thornburg, Thomas Thornburg, William Crooks, Samuel Miller; in October, 
Robert Wilkinson, who became Probate Judge and made his selection of a 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 3 

home spot on that stream called West Creek. Noah A. Wilkinson. Noah B. 
Clark, R. Fanciier. Thomas Chiklers, Thomas Hornor. Solon Robinson, Milo 
Robinson; in November. T. S. Wilkinson. Robert Wilkinson of Deep River. 
B. Wilkinson. Thomas Brown, Jacob L. Brown, claim bought of Charles 
Wilson. Thomas H. Brown, ^\■illiam Clark. J. W. Holton. H. Wells, David 
Hornor. L. A. Fowler. J. B. Curtis. Elias IMyrick. Thomas Reed: in Decem- 
ber. W. A. W. Hulton. Harriet Holton. then a widow, Jesse Pierce. David 
Pierce. John Russell. William Montgomery. 

Persons made claims. — that is the form used l.)y the pioneers. — or 
selected locations, for their friends as well as for themselves, and there is 
no evidence tliat many of these named above actually made settlements in 
1834. Those who did settle in this year were: Thomas Chiklers and family 
in School Giove. on "section 17." in October: William Crooks and Samuel 
Miller, probably in the summer: Solon Robinson and family (in the last day 
of October, claim dated November, and spending that winter with him two 
young men. Luman A. Fowler and J. B. Curtis: Robert Wilkinson of Deep 
Ri\"er and family in November. 

In January of 1835 settlers were. Lyman Wells and John Driscoll : in 
Februarv. \\'illiam Clark, known afterwards as Judge Clark, and family, 
W. A. W. Holton with his mother and sister, and J. W. Holton with wife 
and child. 

In the spring Richard Fancher with his family came to settle on the 
shore of the little lake which he had selected on section 17. a noted section 
for several \'ears, but to his great disappointment he found out before long 
that on that section had been laid an "Indian float." As the year of 1835 
ad\'anced settlers came in quite rapiill}'. In April the "Bryant Settlement" 
was commenced. The names of these Bryants were, Wayne, David. Elias, 
and Samuel D. ; and with them in this settlement was a sister. Mrs. Agnew. 
They called their location Pleasant Gro\-e. 

In May the "INIyrick Settlement" was made by Elias M}-rick. \\'illiam 
Myrick. and 'I'homas Reed : and Centre Prairie was settled by S. P. String- 



4 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

liam and J. Foley. Robert Wilkinson of \\"est Creek also settled on his 
choice location, and north of him. in wliat becan^e known as the West Creek 
woods, Thomas \\'iles and Jesse Bond. In the fall of 1835 the large Hornor 
family came. Da\'i(l Flnrnor and fonr sons, Thomas, George, Amos. Levi, 
a daughter, Ruth, and other children, and Jacob L. Brown, a son-in-law. 
In this year also John ^^'ood from Massachusetts made a claim, Robert Ham- 
ilton settled, ^lilo Roljinson came from New York city, and Henry Wells 
of Massachusetts began his long residence in what became Crown Point. 

The settling of a nev>- region is always a rich, an interesting, sometimes 
a tr\'nig and a dangerfuis experience, whether in planting colonies like those 
early tlnrteen on the Atlantic coast a few hundred years ago. or commencing, 
as thousands did in the nineteenth century, in what was called for many 
years the West, new settlements of white people among Indians and wild 
animals, the native dwellers on our prairies and in our forests. 

The experiences of the pioneers in the prairie belt was different, in some 
respects, from the earlier life of the settlers in the large forests of Ohio and 
of southern and central Indiana, for although they Iniilt their first cabins in 
the edges of woodlands or in groves where they had the shelter of trees, 
instead of being obliged to make clearings in heavy timlier thus opening up 
at first a very small farm, these prairie settlers started at (jnce the large 
"breaking plows," with six or more yoke of oxen attached, and could sow 
and plant the first sunnner after their arrival. And they put up free of any 
expense all of the grass for hav which they could find time to mow. From 
a large amount of heavy labor in what is called clearing land they were thus 
relieved. Thev had at first rails to split for fences, making as they did the 
Virginia worm fence, and this was their heaviest work. 

It is to be remembered that these early prairie settlers, — one family, 
that of William Ross, in 1833, Init not a permanent family, these others in 
1834 and 1835, — were what were called squatters on newly surveyed Gov- 
ernment lands, before Lake county had any civil existence. The legislature 
of Indiana in the winter of 1835 and 1836 divided the territory north of the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 5 

Kankakee River, extending from the organized connty of LaPorte to tlie Illi- 
nois line, into two portions, one to l)ecome Porter connt\- and the other Lake. 
Porter was organized and the territory that was to he Lake was attached 
to it to hring it under ci\-il go\'ernnient. It was cli\-ided into three townships 
and a justice of the peace was elected in each. These were, Amsi L. Ball, 
Solon Robinson, and Robert Wilkinson of \\'est Creek, In 1836, the year 
of the first justice courts, when three or four cases only were tried, settlers, 
came in rapidly. The names of one hundred and thirteen "settlers in 1836" 
have been found on tlie Claim Register. 

As many of these names are likely to appear in the Isiographical sketches 
they are not gi\'en iiere. It will be sufficient to state that in this year there 
came the Taylor and Edgerton and Nordyke families, the families of James 
Farwell and Charles i\Iar\'in. the Church and Cutler families of Prairie West. 
William Alerrill and Dudle}- ^lerrill, and in September George Earle. These 
commenced new centers of settlement. 

The town of Liverpool, which became Lake coimtv's first countv seat, 
was laid out as a town in May probably or in June of this year. The sale of 
lots there in July amounted to sixteen thousand dollars. Lot number 107 
sold for eighty dollars. The men concerned in this town were John B. 
Chapman, Henry Fredrickson, and Nathaniel Davis. A true "paper city" 
was laid out, probably this year, at the mouth of the Calumet River, by a 
company of men from Columbus, Ohio. It was called Indiana City, and 
was designed no doubt to compete, with tlie then young Michigan City and 
Chicago, for the commerce of Lake Michigan. It was sold in 1841, the tra- 
dition is, for fourteen thousand dollars. There is no evidence that it bad 
any inhabitants, and actually it was valueless. 

July 4, 1836, there was organized at the house of Solon Robinson or 
in his grove. The Squatters' LTnion of Lake County. A constitution of four- 
teen articles was adopted, and attached to that four hundred and seventy-six 
signatures have been counted. Some of them, however, held claims in Porter 
countv. 



6 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

In ]\Iarch nf lliis same year a postoffice was estalilished called Lake 
Court House, Solon Robinson, postmaster, bringing tbe mail bimself or by 
a deputy from Michigan City and for which he was to have the proceeds 
of the oirice. Although letters in those days, coming any long distance, cost 
twenty-fi\e cents each, paid by those who received them, the proceeds of this 
office, up to October i, 1836. were only fifteen dollars. 

In this same year was opened the first settlers' store by Solon and Milo 
Robinson, brothers, who sold, before the spring of the next year, about three 
thousand dollars' worth of goods, selling the largest amoun. to the Indians, 
buying from them fur and cranberries. 

COUXTY ORG.VXIZATION. 

By an act of tbe Indiana Legislature Lake was declared to be an inde- . 
pendent county, separated entirely from the jurisdiction of Porter, after Feb- 
ruary 15, 1837. March 8. 1837. Henry \\'ells was commissioned Sheriff, 
and an election was dulv held at the house of Samuel D. Bryant, E. W. 
Bryant Inspectoi. at the bouse of A. L. Ball. \V. S. Thornburg Inspector, 
at the house of Russel Eddy, William Clark Inspector, for the purpose of 
electing a Clerk of the Circuit Court, a Recorder, two Associate Judges, and 
three coimty Commissioners. Solon Robinson was elected Clerk, William 
A. ^\^ Holton Recorder, William B. Crooks and William Clark Judges, 
Amsi L. Ball. Thomas Wiles. S. P. Stringbam, Commissioners. 

April 5. 1837. the Board of Commissioners held their first meeting. 
They transacted, as one might expect, a large amount of business in starting 
all the departments under their jurisdiction in a newly organized county. 
Some of their acts it will be of interest to notice. 

They adopted a county seal. They (li\'i(led the county into three town- 
ships and three commissioner's districts, these having the same geographical 
limits. The number of districts is still three. They appointed J. \\". Holton 
county treasurer arid fixed the amount of his bond at two thousand dollars. 
They appointed ]\Iiio Roliinson trustee of what was then called the Seminary 
Fund, the amount of his bond as trustee to be two lumdred dollars, and they 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 7 

appointed liini also agent of the Tliree Per Cent. Fund, fixing his bond as 
agent at tiiree thousand dollars. They instructed the sheriff to prevent any 
person from taking pine timber from the public land or school lands of the 
county, and to bring such offenders to justice. It was found on trial much 
easier for the commissioners to give these instructions than for the sheriff 
to carry them out. It is an old saying, catch before hanging, and the catch- 
ing part was what the sheriff found to be difficult. 

An amusing instance of an attempt to capture some timber thieves is on 
record. When the young Chicago was beginning to grow and pine timber 
was needed, a report reached the county officers that men were stealing valu- 
able trees from off our northern sand hills. A posse was summoned and 
an independent military company was taken into the service. The party 
took dinner at Liverpool, and proceeded, it is said, with drum and fife sound- 
ing, — how could niililary men march \\ithout martial music? — to the place 
where men had Ijeen cutting down the grand pines. But the men had dis- 
appeared. Knowing that they were trespassers they did not propose to face, 
not only the ci\-il but the military authorities of Lake county. It was cer- 
tainly a novel way to secure the capture of thieves. The county commis- 
sioners finally paid the amount of the different bills, and perhaps they and 
the sheriff learned wisdom from experience. The pine timber went to 
Chicago. 

Solon Robinson, who is good authority for those times, wrote in 1847 
about Lake county, that the sand ridges along Lake Michigan were "orig- 
inally co\ered with a valuable growth of pine and cedar, which has been all 
stript off to build up Chicago." So, according to this statement, the instruc- 
tions given by the county commissioners in 1837 amounted to very little. 

CIRCUIT COURT. 

In October of 1837 was held at Lake Court House, in the Robinson log 
building, the first term of the Lake Cnxuit Court, Judge Sample presiding 
and Judge Clark associate. The other associate. Judge Crooks, does not 
seem to ha\-e been present. There were nine lawyers, and thirty cases for 



8 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

this first term were on the docket. It is reported to have been a very quiet 
session. The majest}', as sometimes manifested, of human law, coming 
for the first time into the wild magnificence of nature ouglit to have quieted 
human passion. 

In this year of the organization of the countv. mail facilities were poor 
while letters were costly. John Russell was sent from Lake Court House to 
Indianapolis to oIit?in the sheriff's appointment and he went and returned 
on foot before a letter could go and return. The postoffice eastward, from 
which the mail was brought, was then Michigan City, distant about forty 
miles, and the ne.xt ones west, in Illmois, were Chicago and Joliet, each also 
distant about forty miles. 

There was in the county at this time one regular physician. Dr. Palmer. 
A quite large log building was put up in the summer by the two brothers. 
Solon and Milo Robinson : it was made later in the year or in 1838 a two- 
story building, and a few frame buildings were in this summer erected. Many 
new settlers came in, and log cabins were becoming quite abundant, with 
their stick and clay chimneys, their puncheon floors, clay plastered walls, 
and roofs made without nails. Of the eighty-one whose names are on record 
as "Settlers in 1837," the Claim Register for that year not being entire, the 
following names are quoted as having been at one time grouped together : 
"Bartlett Woods and Charles Woods, natives of W'inchelsea, England ; 
Llervey Ball and Lewis Warriner of Agawam, Massachusetts ; George Flint, 
Benjamin Farley, Henry Torrey, Joseph Jackson : Henry Sanger. Ephraim 
Cleveland, William Sherman, A. D. Foster, and, first of the German settlers 
on Prairie West, John Hack." These were prominent settlers in different 
parts of the county and their names, with many others of that }-ear, must 
continue to live in Lake county history. 

Religious services ^vere held several times this year at Solon Robinson's 
house and in the log l)uilding at Lake Court House, and at Pleasant Grove, 
where probably the Methodists commenced a formal organization, the first 
on record in the countv. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 9 

These early }ears, so important in laying foundations for the future, 
passed rapidly along with their excitements, their adventures, and, to some 
extent, with their privations, and the date soon came of 1838. 

As early as 1S33 had been opened along the beach of Lake Michigan 
a route for travel, and another road opened not long after a few miles inland, 
and four-horse coaches had been put upon the road by Hart, Steel and 
Sprague, for conveying passengers and mail from Detroit to Fort Dearborn 
which became Chicago. But this, except furnishing a ta\ern-stand or two 
on the lake shore and a ferry across the Calumet, had little to do with the 
settlement or growth of Lake count)'. But in the winter before the summer 
of 1838 Congress established some mail routes through the county, two of 
which were of considerable benefit. One was from LaPorte to Joliet, pass- 
ing through Lake Court House, which was taken by H. S. Pelton. and the 
other was from Michigan City to Peoria, this also passing through Lake 
Court House, now Crown Point, and then southwest, passing near the present 
town of Creston. 

SAW MILLS AND BRIDGES. 

Luniber is a necessar_\' article for any improvement in building beyond 
the primitive log cabins, and enterprising pioneers soon commenced erecting 
saw mills. They seem to ha\'e found considerable difficulty in making their 
mill-dams sufficiently strong to gi\e them water in a dry season and then 
to resist the pressure of a freshet. Four of these earliest mills are accredited 
to the year 1838. called Irom the names of their builders, Walton's, Wood's. 
Dustin's, and Taylor's. The Wood mill, where is now, at \\'oodvale, a large 
flouring mill, furnished the most lumber. 

One mill had been put into successful operation before this year, built 
by \Wlson S. Harrison, which in the spring of 1837 furnished oak lumber 
for fifteen dollars for a thousand feet. The great market place was Michigan 
City, afterwards Chicago, from which places pine lumber could be obtained. 
Pine trees grew in the northern part of Lake count}-, but this was mostly 
stolen and taken to the market in Chicago. 



10 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Bridge-buikling commenced in tliis year of 1838, for wliich work lumljer 
was a necessity. One who looks over tlie county now. especially in the sum- 
mer time, seeing here and there a ditch, but very little flowing water, can 
have no correct idea of our streams in the early days, when free and bridge- 
less, in the spring and (jften in mid-summer, the Calumet and Turkey Creek, 
Deep River and Deer Creek. Eagle Creek, Cedar Creek, and West Creek, 
were sending off their full flow of water to the distant Atlantic, some through 
Lake ^lichigan. and some southwanl through the Kankakee to the Alissis- 
sippi and the Gulf. The stream called West Creek, with its wide marsh, its 
springs, its quicksands, formed, until Ijridges were built, an impassable bar- 
rier for any thing like tra\-el. The horseman was in danger in many places 
if he tried to urge his horse across. Two bridges were built, in this year 
of lumber, across Deep River, a short distance northeast of Lake Court 
House, costing five Inuulred dollars. These were built by Daniel ALay and 
Hiram Xordyke. That bridges were needed across this river then was evi- 
dent, for in the mid-summer of 1837 a very large horse drawing a buggy, 
in an attempt to ford the marshy stream, went down, probably into quick- 
sand, lea\'ing only his head out of water, and only by rapid exertion of his 
dri\-er wiio plunged at once mto the water, was separated from the buggy 
and helped up<)n his feet, regaining the drv prairie on the further side. 

Over West Creek, near the Wilkinson home, a bridge costing four 
hundred dollars was built by N. Havden. Across Cedar Creek, called some- 
times the Outlet, near the home of Lewis Warriner, now the Esty place, the 
Ijridge cost only two hundred dollars, erected by S. P. Stringham and R. 
Wilkinson. The one across Deep River at B. \\'ilkinson's crossing near the 
Porter countv line, built liy Amsi L. Ball, cost four hundred dollars. 

Thus, in the first year of bridge-building it appears that for five very 
needful bridges the amount of fifteen hundred dollars was laid out. The 
money came from what was known then as "the three per cent, fund." 

FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH. 

June 17. 1838. was constituted, according to their denominational usage, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 11 

with nine Baptist members from the two states of Alassachusetts and New 
York, Elder Frencli of Porter county present and acting" as Moderator, what 
was called the Cedar Lake Baptist Church. The meeting for organization 
was held in the large log schoolhouse which was not then quite completed. 
Besides this center two otlier places were selected for holding Sabbath meet- 
ings. Prairie West and Center Prairie, hut these two other places were soon 
given up. It may be added that at the schoolhouse of this first Baptist 
center, public, formal recognition services, according to usage, were held 
May 19. 1839. 

METHODIST ORGANIZ.ATION. 

Says an old manuscript, referring to the summer of 1838, "The Meth- 
odist Episcopal Church mav be considered as regularly organized in the 
county from this time, forming with Porter county a circuit, and supplied 
with preaching at stated times." According, however, to Conference Min- 
utes the circuit which comprised Porter and Lake was not formed till 1840, 
but there was a Ivankakee Mission formed in 1839. and a Deep Ri\-er Mission 
formed in 1835. so that it is probable, as was stated in regard to Pleasant 
Grove, that there was a beginning of Methodist organization in the county 
earlier, Ijut not much earlier, than the Baptist organization. 

These two bodies of Christians, the Methodist and Baptist, were the 
strong religious forces in the early years until the Presbyterians made a 
beginning in 1840, and man\' more iNIethodist than Baptist pioneers came 
into the county. They were successful also in establishing themseh'es in a 
fe\\- centers which did not change as did the Baptist center, until it became 
only a pleasure resort. Before, however, that first Baptist church was com- 
jiellecl to disband by the changes which were taking place, it had on its 
record book th.e names of nearly one hundred members, fort\'-two of whom 
had been baptized in accordance with their usage in the crystal water of their 
beautiful lake. 

Of the earliest Methodist centers, four at least, at one of which a bishop 
once preached, would not now be recognized as places where people ever 
met for worship. 



12 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

This summer of 1838. at the reHgious organizations of which a glance 
has been tal\en. was one of ''continued cHstressing sickness." It is quite 
sure that, in proportion to the number of inhabitants, more deaths took place 
than in any other summer of the county's historw It was a very dry sum- 
mer, called a summer "of excessiye drouth." 

Yet many improyements were made this year, and other settlers came 
in. One party came from the state of New York in four wagons drawn by 
horses, making the journe\- in four weeks. Among these were the families 
of Solomon Burns and George Willey. also Harry Burns. They settled on 
the west side of West Creek, where a little neighborhood was formed com- 
prising the families bearing the names of Rankin. Hitchcock, Gordinier, Mar- 
yin. Burns, FuHer. Farwell, \\'illey, and later of Grayes, Irish, also Blayney. 
which was an almost inaccessible neighborhood from the eastward until the 
constructicm of the Hanoyer bridge. 

THE LAND SALE. 

;\Iarch 19. 1839, came that event for which the settlers had been looking 
and waiting, and yet for which many of them were not ready. The sale of 
United States lands, including the public lands in Lake county, commenced 
on that day in the !own of LaPorte, The, so called, squatters of Lake were 
there in large numbers, some of them hardy pioneers, accustomed to frontier 
life, some of them but recently from New England and New York, who 
had been taking their first lessons in frontier life, and some of them sturdy 
Germans, lately remoyed from the thronging life of Europe into the new 
freedom and abundant room of this western world, all determined to stand 
by each other in seeing that no speculator should bid upon a claimant's land. 
The e\'ent in view of which they had organized the Squatter's L'nion, July 
4, 1836, had now come, and they were prepared to fulfil its agreements and 
its pledges. The impression \vas strongly made that no speculator should 
oyerbid a squatter, and the moral force of the fact that five hundred deter- 
mined men had decided upon that question, was sufficient. Men were chosen, 
according to their agreement, to do the bidding, Solon Robinson for one 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 13 

townsliii), W'iniam Kinnison for another, and A. ^McDonald, whose name 
appears here for the first time in these records, who was afterwards a promi- 
nent lawyer, tlie first one at Crown Point, whose date of settlement is 1839, 
was the bidder for the third township. No speculators interfered. The 
record is : "The sale passed ofi^ quietly, and the sons of Lake returned peace- 
fully to their homes."' 

COUNTY SEAT LOCATION. 

Another prominent event took place this year, in ]\lay, the location oi 
the county seat. The Lidiana Legislature api)ointed the commissioners. 
They, it is to be supposed, looked over the county. Three places sought the 
location. These were, the town oi Liverpool where so many town lots were 
sold in ICS36, the village of Lake Court House, where already a log court 
house was built and where Commissioners" Court and Circuit Court bad been 
held, and where the comity ofiicers were residing, and Dr. Calvin Lilley's 
place at the now well known lake. 

By some means or by some influence the Commissioners selected Liver- 
pool. Great dissatisfaction resulted from their decision, and the citizens 
determined to ask for a re-location. Their request was granted. The Legis- 
lature again appointed commissioners. These were, "Jesse Tomlinson and 
Edward Moore of Clarion county, Henrv Barclav of Pulaski, Joshua Lind- 
sey of \\ bite, and Daniel Doale of Carroll county.'" The same localities were 
in competition as l^efore. George Earle for one, Solon Robinson for one, 
and. instead of Dr. Lilley, Judge Benjamin ]\IcCart\' f(ir the third, having 
b<!ught the Lilley place, laid out tnwn lots and named it \\'est Point. The 
Commissioners came in June. 1840. Donations, large for those days, were 
offered In- the friends of each Incalit}-. Finally. Lake Court House was 
selected as the proper place fiir the county seat of Lake county, those five 
men who ha\-e been named located it tliere, and there for sixt}'-four years 
it has remained. Solon Robinson and Judge Clark, the former setting apart 
forty acres and the latter sixt}- in section 8 for the town that was soon to be. 
laid out seventy-five town lots, donated a large public square, and gave an 



14 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

acre of ground besides the square for a court house and other public build- 
ings, also an acre for school purposes. The two men named were considered 
the proprietors of the town. They donated one-half of the lots and gave 
additional land. Russel Eddy, who became a prominent resident in 1838, 
donated ten acres of land and J. \\'. Holton fifteen. Other donations, some 
in money, some in work, were also made. George Earle of Liverpool was 
appointed County Agent. He and the two proprietors re-named the place 
and called it Crown Point. The County Agent and the proprietors sold lots 
at auction November 19. 1840. The prices varied from eleven dollars up 
to one hundred and twenty-se\'en and a half for a lot. 

The census taken this year by Lewis Warriner gave for the population 
of the county, when Crown Point as a town commenced its existence, 1463 
inhabitants. 

EVENTS FROM 184O TO 185O. 

Without minute details such as an annalist might give, the more im- 
portant e\'ents in these ten years of rather slow growth may be briefly noticed. 

Politicallv. the county was now largely Democratic and in favor of re- 
electing Martin Van Buren ; but there were some, then called \\'higs, among 
these were especially Solon Robinson and Leonard Cutler, who went to the 
great political gathering at the Tippecanoe Battle Ground, joining in the log 
cabin and hard cider campaign of 1840. and helping to elect General Harri- 
son. The two men named were decidedly in fa\-or of temperance and took 
no part, their friends were very sure, in the hard cider part of the celebrations 
of that year. 

Health had prevailed at Crown Point from 1834 to 1843, but in the 
spring of this latter year scarlet fe\-er came in a very malignant form. A 
spot was now chosen for a cemetery and soon there were eight burials. 

^Lanv sheep were brought in from Ohio this same year, and for a time 
Lake county was quite a wool-growing region. A few^ sheep had been 
among the domestic animals of the early pioneers. Their great enemy was 
the prairie wolf. After the large flocks came disease spread among them. 
A few good flocks are still in the county. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 15 

In 1844 the wheat crnp was injured hy rust. The wheat crop of 1845 
was considered \-ery good. But for several years in this decade the average 
price was not more than sixty cents a l>usliel. It was a trying time for 
farmers. Many hecame discouraged. There is evidence from different 
sources that in these years of depression as many as one-half of the earliest 
settlers passed out of the county seeking homes in the then distant West. 

But some improvements in this trying time were made. Gospel min- 
isters came, churches were organized, buildings erected. Almost as soon 
as the county seat cjuestion was settled and Crown Point was named, so that 
Solon Robinson felt sure of the growth of his town, he secured the residence 
of Rev. N. \\'arriner, a Baptist minister who harl Iieen recenth- ordained at 
Cedar Lake, built a house for him near his own home, and helped to provide 
for his support. 

In 1843 K^^'- -^J^- Allman. a Methodist minister, settled in Crown Point. 
Two church buildings were erectetl : one for the Methodist congregation at 
the crossing of West Creek, the other a Romaji Catholic chapel <:in Prairie 
U'est. And, this same year or the next, was built a Methodist church at 
Hickory Point, on the county line, Init in Lake county. 

April 2'j. 1844. was organized, liy Rev. J. C. Brown of Valparaiso, the 
Presbyterian church at Crown Point witli eighteen members. The two prom- 
inent women of this church at this time were, Mrs. Harriet Warner Holton 
and Mrs. Richard Fancher. Elias Bryant and Cyrus M. Mason were the 
first elders. In 1846 Rev. William Townley became the first resident pastor 
of this church. A church building was soon erected at a cost of three thou- 
sand dollars. About the same time, between 1845 and 1847, the Methodists 
also erected a church building. Cost not now known. 

In 1846 sickness again came, and other calamities befell the struggling 
inhabitants of the new county. The summer was very dry, the weather 
was very hot. This is part of a record: "Sickness was almost universal. 
There were few to relieve the wants of the sick or to administer medicine." 
There were no trained nurses to be obtained in those days, and no money 



16 - HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

to pay for trained nursing if it could have been obtained. So the members 
of eacli family did for themselves the best that Avas possible. Physicians 
were few. This is another record: "The summers of 1838 and 1846 are 
the two most noted for sickness in the annals of Lake. Both were very dry 
seasons." Besides the sickness of 1846 fields of grain went to waste, for 
there were no men to do the harvesting. The men and the boys who were 
able to work were taking care of their sick and performing the needful house- 
hold A\ork. .Only those who passed through that trying year can know how 
great the trials were. In the present conditions of the county such a time 
can not come again, even if extensive sickness should again prevail. Increas- 
ing the privations of that memorable year, much of the wheat that some did 
succeed in harvesting was hardly fit for market or for bread, and half the 
. potato crop raised was destroyed by disease. In those years spring wheat 
was quite extensively raised in the county, and potato bugs were destroyers 
unknown. 

That summer of 1846 passed; a number had died, some, perhaps all, 
sadly missed in what had been bright homes: but the living prepared again 
to hope on and live on. A very favorable fall and a mild winter followed. 

In 1847 th.ere were in the county seven postoffices, five saw mills in oper- 
ation furnishing oak lumlier. two grist-mills, 'A\'ood"s mill," which did grind- 
ing for the farmers of both Lake and Porter counties, and ^^■ilson and Saun- 
der's. George Earle of Liverpool was also erecting a third at what became 
Hobart. There were then in the county about fifty frame houses, five church 
buildings, two brick dwelling houses, and five stores. Two of these were 
at Crov.'n Point, one kept by H. S. Pelton and one by William Alton. One 
was at Pleasant Grove, one at Wood's mill, (ine at St. John. There were 
in the county two lawyers, six, perhaps seven, physicians, fifteen justices of 
the peace. There were five local Methodist ministers, one circuit preacher, 
and one Presbyterian pastor. The Baptist pasior, the first minister of the 
Gospel residing in Crown Point, had removed to Illinois. 

The county officers for 1847, ^vhen were completed ten years of organ- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 17 

ized county life, were the following named men: "Henry Wells, Sheriff; 
H. D. Palmer, Associate Judge: Hervey Ball, Probate Judge; D. K. Petti- 
bone, Clerk; Joseph Jackson, Auditor; Major Allman, Recorder: William 
C. Farrington, Treasurer; Alexander McDonald, Assessor; S. T. Green, 
H. S. Pelton, Robert Wilkinson, Commissioners." 

OUR MEXICAN WAR COMPANY. 

Lake county ha\ing made so grand a record in that fearful conflict for 
the life of the nation between 1861 and 1865, it would not be just to omit 
some mention of the deeds of Jier earlier sons in a very diiYerent contest. 

May II, 1846, there was declared by our Government war, stern, and 
ever fearful war, upon the country called Mexico. Fifty thousand volunteers 
were called for by the President. Many young men were ready tO' ofifer 
their services, and to join the forces that were expected to reach — there was 
an air of romance in the expression — tlie "Halls of the Montezumas." 

Joseph P. Smith, a business man of Crown Point, who had been a mili- 
tar\- man in New York city, was at this time captain of an independent mili- 
tary company at Crown Point, and lie with twent}'-five or thirty of these 
men, and others from outside of the county, started for the war. This com- 
pany joined the army in Mexico in 1847. They saw little of what some 
call the glory of war, little of the glitter of JNIontezuma halls. They were 
in no battle. They did that needful but wearing work, guard duty. They 
were si.x months at Monterey. Forty-seven of the company died amid the 
burning heats or on the trying march, and in the fall of 1848 they returned, 
as Tennyson said of the Light Brigade, "all there were left of them." One 
of them who had lived through the sickness and death of so many comrades, 
afterward lived through the sufiferings of the Libby prison, and returned a 
second time, safe from the perils of war. to his home in Crown Point. In 
that later war record his name will appear. 

The year 1849. ^^ years after the Land Sale, and with it the vear 1850, 
closed up in Lake county the true pioneer mode of life, a life that had its 
enjoyments and its privations, a life which has been many times described 



IS HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

on written antl printed pages, but whicli In' the younger people of this gener- 
ation can he 1)ut sHghtly understood or appreciated: yet which made possible 
for them and those coming after them the great advantages wliich are now 
enjoyed. 

Lord Bacon assigned tlie higiiest meed of eartiily fame to the founders 
of States, called in the Latin tongue coiditons iiiipcrioruin. The Pilgrims 
and the Puritans, the Quakers and Covenanters, the Cavaliers and Hugue- 
nots, with many others from the kingdoms of Europe, helpeil to found the 
first thirteen states of this Lnion. Our pioneers founded a county, not a 
large division of country, but twice as large as that noted region, the ancient 
Attica, a division of the old Greece, which contained once a large population, 
seven times as many as we yet ha\-e. And these men and women who laid 
the foundations here are justly entitled to a fair meed of fame, and their 
pioneer life, up to 1850, is worthy of consideration and of due appreciation. 
Some of its peculiarities are in detail yet accessible to the present inhabitants 
of the county. Memorial sketches of many of these pioneers will l)e found 
in this work. According to the L'nitecl States census there were in the 
county in 1850 seven hundred and fifteen families. 

Beautiful, exceedingly l^eautiful, as this region was in its nati\-e wild- 
ness, the prairies, the groves, the woodlands, showing \ery little indication 
that man had e\-er Ijeen here, only some trails, some dancing floors made of 
■earth, some Ijurial places, it did not prove to be an Eden after the white man's 
presence began to be felt in its most choice localities. Virtuous in general 
as the pioneers were, there was so little of society restraint, of civil restraint 
over them, that sometimes the temptations to do wrong proved too strong 
for a feeble \-irtue. But these were rare cases, only a few dark spots, in a 
generally moral, upright, virtuous community. 

When one considers the crimes that are so numerous in these later years, 
not only in towns and cities, but often in country neighborhoods, it is pleasant 
to look back sixty years ago upon the quiet, yet active home life, that was 
spreading out upon the prairies, and to see how secure life and property were, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 19 

and liow fearlessly the young maidens could roam into the -wilds in search ol' 
Howers and fruits, before tramps had an existence: and if they met some 
hunter youth, he was sure to be a friend. Now a lone man is to be dreaded 
and shunned. It was not so then. 

SAD OCCURRENCES. 

In the course of vears. and in anv community, as human life is. there 
will always he some e\'ents of more than ordinary sadness. At least two of 
such events may fittingly be recorded here. The first is the death Ijy freez- 
ing of David Agnew, whose wife was a Bryant, on the ifight of April 4, 
1835. As one of th.e Bryant family making the settlement at F^leasant Cirove, 
it fell to his lot to take an ox team across from Morgan prairie in Porter 
county to the new settlement. 

The weather had been mild with some rain, and snow and cold were no 
longer expected ; Lmt on that .April day there came "a most terrible snow- 
storm." Circumstances had separated Da\'i<l Agnew with the o.x team from 
others of the party, but as the storm became \ery se\ere Simeon Bryant 
stopped at Hickory Point, built a fire, and waited for their coming. They 
came not as expected, and at about four in the afternoon, Simeon Bryant, 
thinking that David .\gnew had coricluded not to come on in that storm, 
building a large fire of logs for a camping place if he should come, started 
on foot for the settlement, distant ten miles west. He was "a remarkably 
strong, robust man," said one of that family, but was very thoroughly chilled 
when at dark he reached the cabin of E. \\'. Bryant. David .\gnew was not 
a very strong or healthy man, and no one thought of his undertaking that 
perilous trip 01 ten long miles on such a fearful night. The next morning, 
when the storm was over, an April fog coming 011, as Simeon Brvant, Daxid 
Bryant, and li. \\'. Bryant went out to look over the land, they saw some 
object lying in the snow, and E. W. Bryant said, 'Tt looks like a dead man." 
David Br\-ant took a closer look and said. "It looks like Agnew." .\nd the 
body of David Agnew it proved to be, beside which those three stout-hearted 
men stood aghast. \\'hat that night had been to him in suffering and in 
struggle none could fully know. 



20 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

1 (jtiote now from the Bryant narrative: "Upon looking round they 
found beaten paths where Agnew had at first run round in a circle to try to 
keep from perisiiing, and then, as if strength had failed so as not to be alile 
to do that, he had su|)piirted himself with his arms around the trunks of the 
trees, running around them till there was quite a path worn and leaving the 
lint of his coat sticking in the bark. He finally got hold of a pole about 
se\-en or eight feet long, and ]5lacing one end on the ground and leaning on 
the other ran round in a circle, until, as it would appear, his strength was 
entirely exhausted i.nd he fell across his support, leaving no sign of having 
made a struggle after." 

W'e can see in this account how heroically he struggled for life, and that 
he should have perished so near to a home and a. shelter seems doubly pit- 
iable. It was found that he had reached Hickorv Point with his oxen and 
wagou, but instead of tr_\ing to camp there uith them l)y the fire, had drawn 
out the keys from the ox bows, dropped them with the yokes all chained 
together upon the ground, thrown out a few unbound sheaves of oats from 
his wagon as food for the oxen, and had started immediately to follow Simeon 
Bryant across the ten miles of prairie and marsh. 

The Bryant narrative says that there was an In.dian trail ])assing by 
Hickory Point and through Pleasant Grove, Init that the night was very 
dark, although the snow-storm was followed liy almost incessant lightning. 
Somehow Agnew made his way across, but perished almost within reach 
of help. 

There have been a few deaths in Lake county the circumstances of 
which ba\-e made them exceedingly pitiable, but none much more so than the 
death 1:)y freezing of David Agnew. 

The other of these occurrences is the death of Peder Olsen Dijsternd, 
a young Norwegian, who was passing through the county in a buggy, with 
one companion, on his way to a settlement of his countrymen across the 
Kankakee River south of where is now Momence. Before reaching his des- 
tination lie was taken sick, and was left Ijy his tra\eling companion at a home 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 21 

near the Red Cedar Lake to recover or to die. Of tlie companion wlio left 
him nothing is liere known. Ignorant as lie was of their language the family 
learned not much from him. but gave him such care as their home afiforded. 
He soon died. The hurial was witnessed liy the writer of this record soon 
after his finding a home at the lake, and to him it ;\as exceedingly sad. No 
kinsman of the dead man jiresent, no countr3-man present, no one to shed 
one tear or speak one pitying word. A few pioneers gathered, undertakers 
in those days were not, and the rude cotlin was conveyed to a little mound 
near the lake shore and the IxKJy of the fine-looking 3'oung stranger was laid 
away to rest. The boy who \\itncssed with a sad heart all the proceedings 
has in the years of his manhood conducted \ery many burial services, he 
has heard the voice of wailing and has witnessed Ijitter weeping, as tender 
earth-ties have been severed, but the burial of the }oung Norwegian stranger 
remains fixed in his memory as the one example of a burial of an unknown 
stranger, alone in a foreign land. Nearly thus was the body of Henry Mar- 
tyn, the missionary, committed to the dust; and of our stranger's death it 
might be said as of Henry Martyn's, 

"no sister's hand, 
No mother's tender care his pillow smoothed. 
All, all he loved on earth were far away." 

But soon there came in search of this Norwegian an uncle, Peter Sather, 
a quite wealthy exchange broker, from the city of New York. He learned 
from the Ball family such facts as were known in the neighborhood, he 
found the burial place of his nephew, he paid to the owner of the claim five 
dollars for the little mound, (he could get no title, as all the land of Lake 
county then belonged to the Government or to a few Indians), and returned 
to his city home. In the Commissioners' Records of Lake county, January, 
1838, that nephew is called a "pauper" whose burial cost the county of Lake 
thirty-one dollars; but in the city of Nev.- York and in his childhood's home 
in Norway he was evidently far from being penniless. What money or its 
equivalent he took with him from his uncle's home, and what became of it, 
probably no one now li\-ing knows. He had not lived "a pauper" if indeed 
thus he died. 



22 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

PICTURES SUGGESTED FOR SOME ARTIST. 

At least three Ijeautiful scenes might he placed on canvas showing some 
few of the many interesting events in Lake county history. 

One is an event in Liilian life here, and Lidian custom; a custom, proh- 
ably, learned from French missionaries. 

The locality is Big White Oak Island in the Kankakee Marsh. The 
time is January i, 1839. The witnesses and narrators are Charles Kenney 
and son of Orchard Grove. The circumstances are these : On that Island 
a French trader named I^slie, who has an Indian wife, has a store. The 
two Kenneys were looking up some horses, and the night of December 31, 
1838, came upon them. They staid at Laslie's place all night. Mrs. Laslie, 
the Indian woman, kind and thoughtful, treated them well, gave them clean 
blankets out of the store on which to sleep, and would receive from them 
no pay. 

I quote now from "Lake County, 1872," a book out of print: "The 
morning dawned. The children of the encampment gathered, some thirty in 
number, and the oldest Indian, an aged venerable man, gave to each of the 
children a silver half-dollar as a New Year's present. As the children re- 
ceived the shining silver each one returned to the old Indian a kiss." Surely 
a beautiful picture could be made from this historic scene, the broftd marsh 
spreading out on each side, southward the line of timber skirting the unseen 
river, the encampment, the two white visitors, the joyous Indian children, 
the aged Pottawattomie, who had years Ijefore been active as a hunter, now 
bestowing the half-dollars, the money of civilization, and bending gracefully 
down to receive the gentle kisses from the children's lips. 

The second of these events is a very different scene. It is the turning 
over of the first furrow on the prairie where was afterward to be the Main 
street of Crown Point. The time is spring, the year 1835. I quote now 
from "Lake County, 1884," also out of print: 

"A large breaking plow with a wooden mold board had been provided, 
four voke of oxen were attached to the plow, and the women and children 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 23 

came out from the caljin? to see the first furrow turned in the green-sward of 
the prairie. Judge Clark held the plow. Thomas and Alexander [his sons] 
gitided the oxen. W". A. \\'. Holton walked behind to aid in turning over 
an}' refractory turf, himself then young and vigorous with that jet black 
hair, that cares little for exposure, which has characterized the Holton young 
men ; while in front of all, to enable the oxen and boys to keep the line, 
walked the tall, spare form of Solon Robinson, even then as white-haired 
as Christopher Columbus when he stood on the deck of the Santa Maria." 

The third of these historic events is a widely different scene. It may 
be called a sacred scene. It is peculiar to Christianity. It is the public 
recognition, the first in this county, of a Christian church. The time was 
May 19, 1839. The locality was the Red Cedar Lake, a few rods south of 
the present Cedar Lake schoolhouse. 

The recognition services were on Sunday, the Christian Sabbath, and 
were held in the grove or the lake woodland, with the shade of the young 
and thrifty oaks over the heads of the pssembled people, and far above the 
leaf crowned treetops the blue May sky, the bright water of the Lake of the 
Red Cedars sparkling in tlie sunlight not far eastward, all the circumstances 
combining to add beauty to the picture. Two aged, venerable ministers 
of the Gospel were present, the stout built, rugged form of Elder French of 
Porter county is in full view and the more slender, less 'vigorous, but yet 
manly form of Elder Sawin of LaPorte. Elder Sawin has just preached to 
the attentive congregation, and now. as the camera is adju.sted, the brethren 
and sisters rising from their seats form a circle in the center of the assembly, 
join their hands, and Elder French in the name of the council of churches 
there represented gives to them the right hand of church fellowship. 

They are seated. Our picture is taken. Other exercises follow. That 
little band, among them the three pioneer men, Richard Church, Lewis War- 
riner, and Hervey Ball, other men in the prime of life, some young mothers, 
and some elderly women, now a recognized church, there in that woodland 
which gave little e\idence that human footsteps Iiacl been on the ground 



2-4 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

before, celebrated for the first time together what is called the Lord's Supper. 
They "took the sacred emblems of blood stained Calvan'." But the picture 
for the painter's brush is the group of men and women so lately members of 
large Eastern churches, as they join hand to hand in the open air of the 
almost untrodden western woodland, to act thenceforth together as a church 
of Christ. 

These ttiree suggested pictures, painted as this writer would paint them 
were he an artist, taking in the natural beauty that was then around the 
human actors, would be treasures on the wall of the Old Settler Historic 
Hall that is to be. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 25 



CHAPTER n. 

The Railroad Period. Outline History from 185 i to 1904. 

When the first half of the nineteenth century closed, the frontier or pio- 
neer method of li\ing, of working, of making sure, but slow progress, was 
coming, in Lake county, to a sudden end. For, eastward, in the distance, 
and not far away, could be heard the sound of the railroad whistle. The 
railroads were coming: the swift passenger cars, the long lines of freight 
cars, with all the changes which these meant to the quiet life of the settlers, 
were coming to help luiild up a mighty city on the Lake Michigan shore 
just outside of the county of Lake. Of necessity, from its geographical situ- 
ation, every railroad entering Chicago, which in 1850 was just commencing 
its remarkable growth, must, coming from the east or southeast, cross the 
northwestern corner of Lidiana. And rapidly they came after a l.)eginning 
had been made. So. when the families in the central part of the county, 
waking one earlv morning in the springtime, besides the sounds, to which 
they were accustomed, of the sand-hill cranes and wild geese in the marshes 
and of the thousands of the grouse on the prairies near them, heard far up 
among their northern sand hills, the shrill whistle of the steam engine, they 
knew that a new agricultural and commercial life was near at hand. The 
very deer were startled by the sound, unaccustomed as they had been even 
to the sound of horns and the having or trailing of dogs, hearing only some- 
times a cowbell in the woodlands. W'Wd life, so abundant as then it was, at 
length grew war}-. The railroads came. The Indians had gone. The deer 
followed them or were exterminated. 

It has always been stated in Lake county history that the first road to 
enter Lake county was the Michigan Central, and the date assigned has lieen 
1850. And this date is found in a paper prepared by Re\-. H. W'ason, one 



26 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

cf the best statisticians of the county, for tlie Semi-Centennial of 1884. He 

says : "For statistical purposes, I append the report of the State Board of 

EquaHzation on Railroads for 1884." one cokunn in that report is lieaded, 

"Time when roads commenced running," and the time for the ^Michigan 

Central is gi\-en, 1S50. This authority is good. And yet the writer of this 

Outline, from some information gleaned in the last few years, hesitates now 

to claim that date, iielie\ing himself to have been responsible for it at first, 

and he thinks the date ought to be 185 1, the same A'ear in which the ^Michigan 

Southern came into the county. 

From the best evidence to be obtained two other dates, as given in thai 

State Board report are here changed, and the following are belie\'ed now 

to be the certain dates of these various roads when trains commenced running 

in the county : 

Michigan Central ■ 1851 

Michigan Southern 185 1 

JoHet Cut Off 1854 

Pittsburg, Fort Wayne, & Chicago 1858 

"Pan Handle" road 1865 

Baltimore & Ohio 1 874 

Chicago & Grand Trunk 1880 

Chicago & Atlantic (Erie) 1882 

New York, Cliicago, & St. Louis (Nickel Plate) • 1882 

Louisville, New Albany & Chicago (Monon) 1882 

Indiana, Illinois. & Iowa ( the Three Ts ) 1883 

Later roads : 

Elgin. Joliet. & Eastern ( Belt Line) - 1888 

Chicago & Calumet Terminal 1888 

\\abash 1892 

Grii^th & Northern ( Freight) 1899 

Chicago, Cincinnati. & Louisville 1903 

These si.wecn roads, taking the whole railroad period of fifty years, are 
placed together here, near the beginning of this Outline, for convenience of 
reference, and that the readers may see at a glance what have so largely 
helped to make Lake county, in the last few years, first in rapid growth among 
all the counties of Indiana. 

On these roads are now three cities, Hammond, East Chicago, which 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 27 

includes Indiana Haidior, and Whiting"; three inxorporated towns, Crown 
Point. Hobart, and Lowell; and se\enteen towns and villages, these having 
a population of one hundred and less up to four hundred and five hundred. 

That Lake C(junty stands first among the counties of the State in the 
number of miles of railroad might naturall}- be expected, Marion, Allen, 
LaPorte, and Porter, coming next in number of miles of road-bed. Three 
of the best roads of the State, which are "great thoroughfares in the nation," 
the ^Michigan Central. ^lichigan Southern, and Pittsburg & Fort Wayne, 
pass across the county. These were assessed for taxation in 1884. "at twenty 
thousand dollars for each mile of road-bed." 

Having looked over the railroads wliich have been built in this period 
of new life and more rapid growth, it will be instructi\-e to look at some of 
the stages of advancement. The first place for shipment of grain and for 
obtaining freight from cars was Lake Station, distant from Crown Point 
fifteen miles. This gave no great impetus to farming or to Iniilding. The 
next stations were Ross and Dyer, and the latter soon became a large ship- 
ping point. Ross Station gave facilities for a dailv mail at Cruwn Point, 
a little stage which carried passengers running up and back daih-. This 
town, the only one in the countv. in fact onlv a village itself for several vears, 
had been slowly impro\'ing in the latter part of the ]Moneer period. The log 
huts had been gradually disappearing, shade trees and fruit trees were taking 
the place of the natixe growth, business houses were increasing in number, 
and in 1849 ^'^^ frame court house was erected. "George Earle architect; 
Jeremy Hixon builder," so the statement on the building said; and from 1850 
to i860 a large amount of Imsiness was done for a small inland town. In 
these years some enterprising and excellent Iiusiness men were building up 
the town. Some of tliese were: J. .S. Holton. J. W. Dinwiddle, Joseph P. 
Smith. William .\lton. A. H. Merton. David Turner. James Bissel. E. M. 
Cramer, J. C. Saiierman. H. C. Griesel, and J. G. HofI'man. There were 
also the firms of Nichols & Nichols, Luther & Farley, Lewis & Dwver, then 
Lewis & Pratt. .\lso, business men. Fred J. Hoffman. Levi Tarr, and W. G. 



28 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

McGlashon. The railroad stations from which goods were haulefl were 
Lake and Ross and at length Hobart. The roads were dirt roads, some- 
times dnsty, scnietimes very muddy, some of the way deep sand. Brick huild- 
ings as well as frame dwellings were erected. In 1858 were built the brick 
dwelling houses of Z. P. Farley, of J. \Mieeler, of J. G. Hoffman, and a three- 
story business house; in 1859 two brick county offices and the brick school- 
htiuse, the Sons of Temperance donating to the schoolhouse one thousand dol- 
lars: and in i860 was erected the present Methodist church building. In its 
steeple was ].ilaced a bell, and since that time the families of Crown Point 
ha\-e been able to hear for these last forty years in their peaceful homes "the 
sound of the cluuxh-going bell." 

The completion of the Pittsburg & Fort \A'ayne road enabled Hobart, 
founded in 1847, to become a prosperous manufacturing town. The mill- 
dam was completed and a sawmill started in 1846, and soon a grist mil! 
was l.usv grinding wheat and corn. Town lots were laid out in 1848. But 
there was little to bring business or inhabitants until the railroad passed 
through to Chicago. Then busy life commenced. Making brick became a 
great industr}-, followed by making what is called "terra cotta lumber and 
fire-proof products." Hobart has continued year after year to improve, 
having as citizens some verj' enterprising and energetic business men, and 
of terra cotta alone, the State Geologist has said that from H(ibart "sixty 
carloads a month are shipped to all parts of the United States." Hobart 
has good, brick buildings and is a thri\'ing little city. 

Another village or town owing its growth if not its origin to that same 
railroad is Tolleston, between the two Calumets, twelve miles due north 
of Crown Point. Its date as a village is 1857. The ^Michigan Central road 
also runs through it, and the Wabash touches its northeastern corner. The 
inhabitants are for the most part German Lutherans and the men work 
on the railroad. It has a large Lutheran church and parsonage and school, 
and the population has reached five hundred. 

For several years no new road crossed the countv, and from i860 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 29 

to 1865 the interest nf tlie inliahitants of the central and southern jjarts was 
concentrated on the events t'nat were threatening the flestruction of the 
nation. Tlie mhabitants north of tiie Little Calumet were then few. Lake 
county having been strongly Democratic in its earlier )-ears, became, when 
those trouljlous times came on. intenseh- Republican, and sent to the war, 
as men were needed, company after company of her lirave antl patriotic 
sons, until, so far as can be determined, fully one thousand had joined the 
regiments of Indiana antl Illinois to help decide the great question then at 
issue over all the land. The population of Lake count}- in 1S60 was 9,145. 
This number, of course, mcludes men, women and children, also men too 
infirm or too far advanced in life to perform a soldier's dutv, and leaving 
these all out, it will appear that Lake county sent a large proportion of men 
into the fierce cuntiict. Sonie of them returned, but not nearlv all of the one 
thousand. 

Much money was sent back to their homes by the soldiers on the field, 
and in a new form: what were called "greenbacks'" then came into circu- 
lation, and many improvements in the county were thus made. 

It was not a time for building railroads, and yet, in 1865. a road came 
up from the southeast, passing directly through Crown Point onward to 
Chicago. It has had several names Init is now generally known as the Pan 
Handle. For this the business men had been wishing long. They had for 
about fifteen years felt the great disadvantage of being "inland;" of bringing 
all their goods and sending ofY their butter, eggs, and prairie chickens, 
immense numi:;ers of which they shipped, on wagons that went back and 
forth to Ross and Lake and Flobart. To them and to all Crown Point the 
railroad was a cause of new life. Xew growth began and kept steadily on. 

In the s])ring of 1868 the town was incorporated. 

This road gave two other stations, one at Le Roy. which though a small 
village became a large shipping point, and one called Schererville. a larger 
village, mostly German families, and a place for some shipments. As the 
road left the county south of the Calumet it gave no growth to the northern 
townships. 



30 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Tlie year 1870 came with no other new road. But without a road, 
withou.t mucli prospect of one, a town of no httle importance liad laeen grow- 
ing up in the soutli part of the county in these eventful years from i860 
to 1870. Its commencement may he placed as early as 1850. Its founder 
was ^Melvin .\. Halsted. It is called Lowell. It is located in the hest agri- 
cultural portion of the county. West of it lies the southern portion of Lake 
Prairie, and east of it and south of it the rich farming belt skirting the 
Kankakee marsh lands. As early as 1836 it was selected as a "mill seat on 
Celar Creek" by John P. Hoff. of New York City. He purchased the 
claim from Samuel Halstead. who had selected and claimed it in August, 
1835. In November. 1836. the New York man having forfeited his right, 
it was transferred for two hundred and tweh'e dollars to James ]M. Whitney 
and Mark Burroughs. It came at length into the possession of Aleh'in A. 
Halsted, whose name is not written as was the first Halstead. He com- 
menced his long residence there in 1850 in a brick house, built a flouring 
mill in 1852. laid out town lots in 1853. and secured the erection of a brick 
church building in 1856, a small brick schoolhouse, used as a church, ha\ing 
been built in 1852. About 1853 Lowell's first store was opened by Jonas 
Thorn, and about 1857 \\'illiam Sigler"s store and soon after Viant's store 
were opened for business. These two were for some time the two principal 
stores of Lowell. The growth of Lowell was also advanced in these years 
before i860 by a settlement made in 1855 and 1856 by a group of families 
from New Hampshire, who made their homes near the heart of Lake Prairie. 
This was known for some years as the New Hampshire Settlement. 

The citizens of Lowell were not behind others in the war period, from 
i860 to 1865, in showing their loyalty to the flag and in sending men to 
the conflict. Their deeds as patriotic citizens belong to a later portion of 
this Outline. 

In going on along this railroad period from 1870 to 1880, it will be 
interesting to notice yet further the enterprise and growth at Lowell. One 
lesson might here be learned, the benefit for a town to be situated in a grow- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 31 

ing and rich farming community. In 1869 and 1S70 new church liuildings 
were erected, making in Lowell tour churches. In 1S72 Lowell had the 
largest and best school building in the county, built of brick, a two-story 
structure, costing, with the furniture eight thousand dollars. The other 
largest building at that time in tlie county was also at Lowell, a brick l.nhld- 
ing of three stories, built for a factory, eighty feet long and fifty feet wide. 
also costing eight thousand dollars. At that time there were in Lowell one 
hundred and six families. B'or some years Lowell was the strongest tem- 
perance town in the county. It had a Good Templars Lodge with one hun- 
dred and sixty members. 

In 1874 there came yet another railroad, the Baltimore & Ohio. Init it 
kept so very close to the shore line of Lake [Michigan that it added very little, 
as to anv grov.-th in the county. It gave one station called Miller's, among 
the sand hills of the northeast township now called Hobart. about one mile 
and a half from the Lake Michigan shore. The Michigan Southern had 
passed along among those sand ridges in 185 1. 

The ice business formed for years the principal business at Miller's 
Station, to which was afterwards added shipping sand, both profitable indus- 
tries, and requiring no large amount of capital on the part of the men who 
carrv them on. A gra\-el road has been made from Lake ^Michigan through 
this village to the town of Hobart, and there is a good church building and 
good public sch.ool building. The inhabitants are mostly Swedish Lutherans. 
There is one large store. 

About 1S69. perhaps 1870, a small industry was commenced on the 
Calumet River and the early Michigan Central Railroad near the Illinois 
State line. The place was called the State Line Slaughter House. About 
eighteen men were employed, and three or four carloads of beef packed in 
ice were shipped each day to Boston. It was understood that George H. 
Hammond of Detroit was the head of the company who started this line of 
business. The men worked seven days in the week for a long time, never 
stopping for Sunday. As the business increased village life started. In 



32 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

1872 there was one store, one boarding house. After a few families moved 
in besides the early settler-families (the Hohman. Sohl, Drecker, Dutcher, 
Booth, Miller, Goodman, Olendorf and Wolf families, of that corner of the 
county), a Sunday-school was proposed, organized, and carried on, and 
then regular Sunday work ceased. Sending beef to Boston soon assumed 
quite large proportions. The village was becoming a town, and to the town 
was given the name of Hammond. Could the founders, men from New 
England, have thought that on those sand hills or ridges and those marshes 
of 1870 in a few years a city would be flourishing with only an air line 
between it and the southeast corner of the city of Chicago, they would 
probably have laid foundations with more care. It seemed far enough away 
from any Christian civilization in 1870. For a footman on a cloudy day 
to have undertaken to cross, then, from the slaughter house to the little 
station called Whiting on the Michigan Southern road, would have been 
very risky. The distance in a straight line is about five miles : but the swampy 
underbrush then was well called impenetrable. This writer tried crossing 
there once, years after 1870. He failed, and he liad been in many a wild. 

Hammond continued to grow. The first plat of the town as so called 
was recorded at the office in Crown Point in the spring of 1875. A growth 
had already commenced there which soon made Hammond the first place 
in the county for manufactures, for shipments, for population. 

In these years, from 1870 to 1880, there was growth elsewhere also in 
the count}-. In 1873 the building of brick blocks of business houses com- 
menced in Crown Point. The first three large halls were in that year 
opened. These were : The Alasonic Hall, Cheshire Hall, now Music Hall, 
and the Odd Fellow Hall. In 1874 A\as organized the First National Bank 
of Crown Point. 

In 1872, on an island in the Kankakee ]^Iarsh, a singular enterprise 
was commenced. The island, called School Grove, as it was on section six- 
teen, afterward Oak Grove, a beautiful grove surrounded by marsh and 
water, was an early home for a trapper known as John Hunter. Heath 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 33 

& Milligan of Chicago afterward bought some land on this island, and with 
eight other Chicago men Iniilt in the grove a hunters" home in 1869. It 
\vas called Camp Milligan. The entries in their Hunters' Record Book 
show that no shooling was done there on Sundays, and that eight men in 
a few davs shot five hundred and thirteen ducks. The one who kept this 
camp, G. Vx. Shaver, has the record of shooting in 1868 eleven hundred 
ducks. In 187 1 there visited this camp a young man from England, William 
Parker, said to be a member of a family belonging to the nobility of England 
and heir to the title of an English peer. \\'ith him, in some relation, was 
an older man called Captain Blake. These were so well pleased with the 
island and the abundance of wild fowl that, after visiting England, they 
returned in 1872, laid out quite an amount of monc}- in lands and buildings 
and stock. The buildings c<imi)rised a (|iiite large dwelling house, barns 
and kennels. Thev imported from England "some sixteen of the choicest 
blooded dogs known to sportsmen." and sc^iie choice Alderney cows and 
some horses. Other choice stock they imported or purchased. They hat! 
a black Ijear and some foxes. The establishment was called Cumlierland. 
Lodge. A younger brother of \\'illiam Parker came with the others in- 
1872, who was for a time a very pleasant member of Crown Point societv.. 
Captain Blake seemed quite communicative to the writer of this sketch, 
whn visited tlie Lodge and was much interested in examining' the kennels 
nnd in seeing all the animals that came from England, but the real reason 
for such a singular in\-estment. which was soon passed into other hands, 
remains to this da\- unkno\An in Lake count}-. Lord Parker, if that is now 
his title, if now living, could give the real reasons. Short as was the resi- 
dence of these English \-isitors in the county, they laid out c|uite an amount 
of money and so aided the business interests of Lowell. And Lowell iv 
these years was steadily impro\ing, as also was Hobart. The increasing- 
productions and wealth of the farmers were building up Lowell; n-ianufac- 
turing was building up Hobart. 

In 1875 was (jrganized at Crown Point the Old Settlers' Association: 



34 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

in 1876 quite an interest was manifested in collecting specimens of mineral, 
agricultural, and manufactured products for the Centennial at Philadelphia. 
A numher of the citizens ^•isited Philadelphia that summer, among whom 
was Wellington .\. Clark, Escp. who spent twenty-four days viewing that 
great exposition. 

The votes of the count}' this year as cast for governor were 3.187, 
showing that there must have been at that time as many as thirty-two hun- 
dred voters. In this same vear a large brick business house was erected by 
Geisen, Eancher & Groman. .\nd in 1878 a brick block costing about fifteen 
thousand dollars was built by Hartupee, Griesel, and J. D. Clark. Se^jtember 
15, 1S79, is the date on record for the beginning of the occupation of the 
new court house, the corner stone having been laid in the presence of a large 
assembly of citizens September 10, 1878. It cost fift}--two thousand dollars. 

The year 1880 came and cars began to run on a new road, the Grand 
Trunk. This road gave a station at Ainsworth \\hich grew into a small 
Tillage, passed through what became Griffith, and helped to build up no 
town. But it did what was probably better. It sent a morning milk train 
•over its line of road, stopping at every place convenient for the farmers, 
to recei\e their cans of milk. These stopping places, called milk stands, 
were very convenient for the farmers and their families" who wished to spend 
the dav in Chicago, as the train would stop in the evening to put off the 
■empty cans. 

In 1880 was erected the central Crown Point brick school building at 
a cost of twenty thousand dollars. In 188 1 brick buildings forming a block 
or part of a block were put up by John Griesel, Conrad Hoereth. and the 
National Bank: and another lirick building in 1882 by J. H. Abrams: and 
yet another in 1883 by Warren Cole. The year 1881 was the great year 
for railroad building in the county, and in 1882 cars were running on three 
new roads, called the Erie, the Xickel Plate, and the Monon. The Erie 
passed through Crown Point or near it, and enlarged its business and its 
bounds; it passed through Hammond and helped that to enlarge; it gave 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 35 

milk stands along its line, and two of its stations. Palmer and Highland, 
are villages. Highland has a factory and two good chnrch luiildings. The 
Xickel Plate helped Hobart and Hammond. It did little good for Hessville. 
The Alonon niade a \-illage of Shelby and gave to Lowell communication by 
rail and telegraph with all the outside world. It furnished a name and a 
place for shipment in a neighborhood no\;- known as Creston, where descend- 
ants of Red Cedar Lake pioneers yet live: and passing along the western 
shore of that lake it made of it a great pleasure resort, visited by thousands 
each summer. It passed northward making a station and a town of St. John, 
and helped D\er and Hammond. It also sent through the county a morning- 
milk train. It has proved to be for many interests a very important road. 

In 1883 -^ road passed across the south end of the county, as Re\-. H. 
W'ason said, "came quietlv creeping u]) the Kankakee marsh."' commonly 
known as the three I's (the I. I. I.), which ])robably added some business 
life to Shelby. 

In 1883 Decoration day began to be publicly observed in Crown Point. 
James H. Ball. Esq., now Judge Ball of Kansas, delivered the oration. In 
1884 Judge E. C. Field, now of Chicago, gave the oration. 

At the presidential election in 1884, there were cast for four candidates 
4,145 votes, showing that there were then, in the fiftieth year of the county's 
growth, about forty-one hundred and fifty \'oters. 

THE SEMI-CENTENNIAL. 

A semi-centennial celebration of the beginning of permanent settlement 
of the count}- \-i'as held on the Fair Ground September 3d and 4th, 1884. Con- 
siderable preparation was made for this event through the Old Settlers' Asso- 
ciation, and by a large number of citizens n-iuch interest was taken in pre- 
paring for the proceedings and in carrying then-i out. A volume of 486 
pages containing a full account of the proceedings was soon afterwards 
published, and to that the reader is referred for full details. It is called 
"Lake County. 1884." It has been for i-nan\- vears "out of print." but is in 
the libraries of many citizens of the county, and in some large public liliraries. 



36 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

It will be sufficient, probabh'. to state bere that a large general committee 
of arrangements was appointed, thirty subjects named and assigned to writers 
for historical papers, and six special committees appointed. Of those who 
were on these tlifferent committees eleven are not now living. Also, that 
an oration was delivered by previous appointment, which by the special influ- 
ence of the chairman of the committee, George W'illey. Esq., was assigned to 
T. H. Ball, who occupied one liour of time in its delivery; that an address 
was given to the members of the Association of Pioneers and Old Settlers 
"by Congressman T. J- ^^■ ood" ; and that a semi-centennial poem was read 
comprising twenty-five stanzas of eight lines each. The oration, address, 
also the poem, can be found in full in "Lake County, 1884." Also, that 
sevenlv-one lelics and antiquities of various kinds, historic and prehistoric, 
were presented for inspection. Xot numbered among these were also twelve 
either old or curious coins, making the full number eighty-three. Most of 
these rare, curious, valuable relics and heirlooms are supposed to be still 
in the county, and some of them can probably be secured for the Association 
when a suitable room is found in which they can be preserved. 

Besides the exercises at the Fair Ground on the two days of W'ednesda}' 
and Thursday, literary exercises were held on Wednesday evening at Hoff- 
man's Opera House m Crown Point, the Crown Point Band, that then 
was, furnishing some excellent music: Willie Cole and Aliss Allie Cole gi\'ing 
a flute anci piano duet : singing al&t> by a cpiartette, Benton Wood, Cassius 
Griffin. Miss Ella Warner, Miss Georgie E. Ball. Mrs. Jennie Young, pianist. 
On the first day of the celebration the opening hymn was the well known 
one, "My Country 'Tis of Thee." i_in the second day the new hymn was sung 
called "Our Broad Land." 

l'"urther features of this celebration cannot here be given, but this writer 
ho]5es that thirty years from now, in 1934. a still larger gathering will be 
found upon the Lake County Fair Ground, when a book now in the Recorder's 
office is then to be opened, a book presented to the Association bv Hon. 
Joseph A. Little, and which contains very many signatures of persons present 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 37 

at Lake County's semi-centennial in 1884. A special committee, to be 
appointed thirty }-ears hence, is to open that at present sealed book. To be 
called for and to be opened at that same time, by that same committee, there 
is now sealed up in the Recorder's office a quite large map of Lake county 
On this map are the names of many children some of whom, as men and 
women, it is expected will be ])resent then. 

On Saturday. September 17. 1887. at four o'clock in the afternoon, the 
real work began of boring an artesian well on the south side of the public 
square in Crown Point. One half of the cost was to be paid by the town and 
one half by the county. The work was carried diligently on, into an immense 
mass of rock which seemed to underlie the town, until the fall of i88cj, when 
work was given up, as there was no reason.able hope of obtaining flowing 
water without an outlay of more money than it was considered wise to expend. 
The depth reached was aliout 3,100 feet. In the summer of 1887 two steam 
dredges were busily at work cutting ditches in the Kankakee ^Nlarsh. .\t- 
tempts to drain that wet land by ditching had been made by state legislation 
soon after 1852. some large ditches had been dug. but the methods employed 
were costly and slow in attaining results. The newly employed steam 
dredges worked busily in 1888 and 1889. and in the latter year, by means of 
the ditching through the marsh, a road was opened from the Orchard Grove 
postoffice to \\'ater \'alley. on the east line of the town lots laid out that 
year by the Lake Agricultural Company and called "the village of Shelbv." 
It was found that the sand brought up by the dredge made a good road-betl 
and so bridges were built across the ditches that went westward, and a bridge 
for wagons over the Kankakee River, and at last there was a good wagon- 
road leading from Lake county over into Xewton, Soon there was another 
road passing by Cumberland Lodge in Oak Grove, and another bridge, and a 
road running directly south to Lake Village in Xewton. It was a new and 
a pleasant experience, after so many, many years, to be able to ride in a car- 
riage down to that long line of blue which had ended the view southward 
in Lake county, and to pass that great barrier of marsh and river, and visit 



38 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

t!ie citizens of Xewton county. \\'hile as to distance in miles they had been 
neighbors, as to access to their homes they had been for more than fifty years 
strangers. 

Returning to the history proper of the railroad period in this Conipenchuni 
or Outline, five other roads are yet to be noticed. 

In 1888 the Elgin, Joliet & Eastern road commenced running cars across 
the county from Dyer to Hobart, but as a belt line, a freight line, adding not 
much to business or agricultural interests. In the same year, 1888, several 
miles were built and used of a road called the Chicago & Calumet Terminal. 
This must have aided much in building up a city the first family in which 
commenced a residence in 1888. The name East Chicago was given to the 
locality, and the name of the first resident family was Penman. This locality 
was truly "in the woods" or the wilderness state in 1888. Sand ridges, and 
marshes, long and narrow, parallel with the ridges, and thick underbrush 
of a swampy and not an upland growth, characterize that strip of land north 
of the Grand Calumet for some miles eastward. It was not an attractive spot 
on which to build a city. But it was near a great city, and work commenced. 
The swampy growth was cleared out of the way. Sand ridges Avere quite 
easily transferred into the low, wet places. Dwelling houses were erected, 
manufactured articles were produced soon in the factories, a saw mill fur- 
nished a large cpiantity of lumber, various industries were soon starting into 
existence, and in a little time, almost as if by magic, there were long streets 
lined with city-like buildings, there were stores filled with goods, there were 
school buildings and churches and waterworks and electric lights, social or- 
ganizations, clubs and lodges, a well conducted newspaper, an electric railway 
line passing through, and the needed adjuncts of a modern city. East Chicago 
was for a short time an incorporated town, and then, not waiting long there, 
it became an incorporated city. The Penman family of 1888 soon had around 
them some three thousand neighbors. Much was done in building up this 
cit_\' by the Terminal railroad. 

Another citv S(jon started. There had been for se\-eral vears a station 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 39 

village called Whiting, on the Michigan Southern road, which in 187^ con- 
tained fifteen families. Railroad work was the main employment. In 1889 
some land was there hought. according to popular report, for one thousand 
dollars an acre, and nine hundred men were soon employed in erecting a 
large brick building for what it was claimed would be the largest oil refinery 
in this country. The estimate was for twenty millions of brick to be used 
in the construction of the first large building. 

This was the beginning of the work of the Standard Oil Company in 
Lake county. In 1890 about seventy-five votes were cast. In 1895 the town 
was incorporated. In 1900 about fifteen hundred votes were cast. The town 
is a city now. 

Starting as a town and to become a city in 1899, its growth, like that of 
East Chicago, has been remarkable. It is located on quite le\-el land on the 
first low ridge of sand that here skirts Lake Michigan, with no sand hills east- 
ward for several miles and none westward lietween it and Chicago. Whiting 
has some fine resident and business streets, but not much roiim for^territorial 
growth, being surrounded liv Lake ?klichigan. East Chicago, and Hammond. 

In the winter of 1890 and 1891 there was much excitement in Lake 
county on account of a strong eft'urt on the part of some citizens of Hammond 
to secure the passage of a bill by the State Legislature which would lead to 
the removal of tlie county seat from Crown Point to Hammond. For fifty 
years the question of the county seat location had been at rest: but this winter 
restless and amhitious men were determined it should rest no longer. The 
citizens of Crown Point and citizens of other counties fought against the bill 
and its passage was defeated. 

In the summer of 1891 Main street and some other streets of Crown 
Point were paved with cedar blocks. September 10, 1891, at about 6:30 
o'clock, electric lights first flashed out in Crown Point. The date of the 
first electric lighls at Hammond is not at hand. In fact Hammond, East Chi- 
cago, and Whiting have grown sn rapidly from nothing to cities, that to keep 
trace of their improvements is almost bewildering. 



40 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

In 1891 was founded the town of Griffith. Its location was excellent, 
on the Cut Oft' and the Belt Line, on the Erie and the Grand Trunk. It made 
a promising beginning. In 1892 it h.ad four factory buildings, one church 
edifice, two Sabbath congregations, two Sunday-schools : and in these schools 
were eighty members. Two years liefore the family of the station ageiit lived 
alone in tlie woods and the undergrowth. It is not yet a city, bright as its first 
promise was. It has two schoolhouses, some stores, and a good many dwell- 
ing houses. It has an abundance of room for growth. It needs enterprise and 
capital. 

In 1892 the Wabash line of road was completed across the county. It 
scarcely touched Tolleston, hut passed through East Chicago and Hammond. 
It added not much to the growth of either of these places. 

The year 1893 '^^"''^^ "^'"^ ^^'^^' ^'^ ''^ remembered in Lake county, as the 
inhabitants so largely had the opportunity of attending the Columbian Ex- 
position at Jackson Park. Their locality was favorable: the number of rail- 
roads running near so many of their homes, passing in the morning and re- 
turning in the evening as the passenger cars did, gave them excellent oppor- 
tunities for spending the days at the expositon and the nights at home, and 
well ilid thev improve their opportunities. An effort was made to obtain the 
■exact nuniljer of school children that visted Jackson Park, but only a part of 
the teachers made any report. So the whole number can never be known. 
There were reported, through the kind consideration of quite a number of 
teachers, pupils from Hobart graded school 250, from Ross township 47, from 
Hanover 24, from Crown Point t,/^. from Eagle Creek township 83, from 
Cedar Creek 53, from West Creek township 84. making, with a few other 
small numbers reported. 973. Certainly never before did so many thousands 
and hundreds of thousands of people cross Lake county ?s in that yery 
pleasant summer of 1893. 

The year 1894 w-as a very different year. It was noted for great stagnation 
of business in mining and manufactures, the year of the Pullman Ijoycott, the 
Debs strikes, and the miners' strikes, and railroad communication with Chi- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 41 

cago for a time ceased. In Hammond the civil officers were unable to main- 
tain order and enforce law and United States troops and about eight hundred 
Stale militia of Indiana were sent in to secure railroad transportation and the 
passage of the mails through the city. A gatling gun stood on the platform 
at the Erie station and the passenger room could be reached only Ijy passing the 
sentry and the corporal of the guard. The tents, the soldiers on duty with 
their arms gave to Hammond the appearance of a city under real martial law. 
Cars on the electric railway were running in the summer of 1894 so that pas- 
sengers could go into Chicago from Hammond on the electric and elevated 
roads. 

The year in Lowell was noted for much building. Thirty-one dwelling 
houses and four business houses were erected within the year. Cedar-block 
pa\-ing was laid on nine more streets in Crown Point at a cost of over forty- 
five thousand dollars. 

The Superior Court at Hammond dates from 1895. 

Some interesting figures are here inserted, obtained from the County 
Auditor, then A. S. Barr. The valuation of the taxable property of the 
county for 1895. without railroad, telegraph, and telephone property, was 
$15,224,740. The number of polls in 1895 was in North township 1,929, 
and the number of men over twenty-one years of age was 4,309 ; number 
of polls in the county 4.265, and of men 8,216. The trustees reported for the 
same year school children in North township 4,068, and in the cmintv 9.380. 
The United States census gave the population of the countv in 1890, 23,886. 

In May. 1896, was oj^ened for public use the electric railwav from 
Hammond direct to South Chicago between Lake George and W'olf Lake, 
thus enabling one to go for three fares only into the heart of Chicago. In 
August of this year the Crown Point Telephone Company began erecting 
poles and putting up wires. The road improvement for the year was in 
Hobart township, the road leading from the south line of the township 
through Hobart and Lake to Lake Michigan. 

November 3d of tliis year, a presidential election, there were votes cast 



42 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

in the county, for Congressman. 8.300: for President. 8,267; of these 3,384 
were for Bryan, 4,883 for McKinley. Also some Proliibition votes. In 
the county probably 8,400 voters. In 1884 there were about 4,200. The 
numlier of voters was doubled in tweh-e years. Of the 8.300 votes in Xovem- 
ber of 1896 there were in North township 4,328; in Center township 842. 

February 16. 1897. made the sixtieth year of the existence of Lake 
as an independent county, and it happened to be the four hundredth anniver- 
sary of the bu'th of the noted ?\Ielancthon of the Reformation. 

The numlier of children of school age enumerated this year was 9,834. 
Of these, in North township were 4,512, Hammond having 3,106, and East 
Cliicago 547. Crown Point had 689, and Lowell 356. Hobart, town and 
county together. 859. North township, including Whiting then and the 
county, had the same number, 859. These figures from the official reports 
are given that the growth and the nature of the population may be more 
readily seen. In the manufacturing cities there will naturalh' be more men 
and more voters in proportion to the children than in the country towns. 

In 1898. according to a cpiite careful count, there were in the three older 
towns of the countv the following number of families: In Crown Point 
580: in Lowell 290: in Hobart 315: in even hundreds 600, 300, 300. It 
has been already stated that in 1850 there were in all Lake county 715 fam- 
ilies. No attempt was made to count the families of Hammond, East Chicago, 
and Whiting. 

For the year 1899 the great improvement going on in the county was 
road-making. Some of the roads were called gravel, and others stone roads. 
Before this year eleven miles of gravel road had been made in Hobart town- 
ship. 

The following paragraph is quoted : "Cost of different roads : In 
Hobart township, ist gravel road, $36,990, 2d, $21,990, 3d, $36,990, mak- 
ing in all for Hobart, $95,970. In North township, the Bradford roads, 
$124,500. In Ross. $71,485. In Cedar Creek, $47,540. In Calumet, $42,988. 
In St. Johns and Center, $167,500. and in Center, the Jenkins road, $12,900, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 43 

in all for St. Johns and Center roads, $180,400. Grand total for roads in 
the seven townships, $562,883, or a little more than half a million of dollars." 

These were not all completed till 1900. .\round the puhlic square in 
Crown Point was laid a walk of sandstone, the stone ten feet in length, five 
in breadth, and six inches in thickness, the walk costing $11,000. 

The Nineteenth Century closed upon a certainly prospering, enterprising 
CGiunumit}' in this county of Lake. 

Li 1899 O"^ more railroad was constructed running from Griftith to 
Lake Michigan and then westward, called the Griffith & Northern. This is 
a freight road and made no towns. 

In June, 190 1, work was commenced in the northeast part of the linuts 
of East Chicago, miles away then, however, from its factories and stores 
and dwellings, for new industries, especially for a large, independent steel 
mill, which was to furnish employment, when in full operation, for one thou- 
sand men. In July, when the locality was first visited by this writer, about 
one hundred and fifty men were at work 'grading the ground for streets and 
for buildings, and breaking the ground for a new city. It was an interest- 
ing sight. This record was made in .\ugust, 1902: ".V large mill building 
has been erected called The Inland Steel ;\Iill, and on Moudav, .\ugust 11, 
1902, 'the wheels of the big mill were started to receive the first iron of 
the rolls." A well sunk by the Inland IMill people 276 feet deep will furnish 
abundance of good water. Indiana Harbor is alreadv a town, almost a 
city of it.self. Its future none can foresee, but it promises now, when its mill 
work is all in operation and its harbor constructed, to make East Chicago 
one of the great lake cities of Indiana."' 

Indiana Harbor, as this part of East Chicago is called, is rapidly making 
good the pronu.se of 1902. Since February 20. 1904, electric cars have 
been running between the two divisions of the city. To one who saw cities 
try to grow in northern Indiana sixty-seven years ago, and saw them fail, 
it is amazing to see how cities now .spring up and grow. Electricity is a 
great agent now. Money and energy, steam and electricity, are doing 



44 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

much for Lake county in its rapid advance among the counties of tiie State. 

In 1903 yet another road was completed as far as Griffitli, tlie Chicago, 
Cincinnati & Louisville road, whicii promises to be an imjiortant thorough- 
fare when its trains can reach Chicago'. It has made the \illage of MerriH- 
ville, wiiich had waited long, a railroad town, and may yet add quite a little 
prosperity to Griffith. 

Besides tiie sixteen roads named, most of them important roads of the 
countr}', there are six short lines within the count\' as given l)v the State 
Board of Tax Commissioners for 1903. These are; Chicago Junction, 
length three miles, fractional parts omitted ; East Chicago Belt, fire miles ; 
Indiana Harl^or, nearly five miles; Sfjuth Chicago & Southern, seven miles; 
Standard Oil Company, fnurteen miles; Chicago. Lake Shore & Eastern, 
eight miles; making, according to that report of the State Board, miles of 
main track in Lake county. 324.28. and of side tracks. 194.55. Lake county 
has many more miles of railway than an}- other county in Indiana. 

According to the United States census the population of Lake count}' 
in 1900 was 37,892: the population of Hammond was 12,376; of Whiting 
3,983; and of East Chicago, 3.411. The population of \\'hiting may still be 
placed, in round numljers. at 4,000 ; and that of East Chicago, which includes 
within its limits that new locality called Indiana Harbor, may also be plac'ed 
at 4,000. It thus appears, by consulting a county ma]i, that more than 
twenty thousand of the inhabitants of the county live within h\e miles of 
the southeast limits of Chicago. Acct)rding to a state authority the numlier 
of voters in the county in 1901 was 11,162, of these 16 l>eing colored men. 

AN ASSOCIATION. 

The Old Settlers' Association, of which mention has been made, was 
organized at the court house in Crown Point, July 24, 1875. The first 
public meeting was held at what was the old Fair Ground, September 25, 
1875. September 14, 1876, the annual meeting was held at the same place. 
September 15, 1877. on account of rain, the meeting was held in Chesliire 
Hall. September 10, 187S, after tlie public exercises connected with laying 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 45 

the ccirner stone of the new court house, the fourth meeting was lield at the 
old Fair (iround. hi 1879 the Association met in the then new Fair Ground. 
In 1880, met again in Clieshire Hall. In 188 1 and iS8j, met in Hoffman's 
Opera House. In 1883 and 1884 at the Fair Ground. Since 1884 the annual 
reports of the Historical Secretary have heen printed every five years for the 
memhers of the .Association and other citizens of the county. Si.xteen of 
these reports are nuw in jirint, four more will this year be in writing, and 
these, if continued on, will furnish, it is supposed, quite an amount of in- 
formation for the historian, whoever he may be, of 1934. It is probable that 
no other county in Indiana has so full historic records. , 

At the annual meeting in August, 1903, the name of the Association 
was slightly changetl. The "s" was dropped from the word "Settlers" and 
the word "Historical" was added, so that die name now is The Old Settler 
AND HiSTORic.\L .Associ.vnoN of Lake County, Indiana. It is expected that 
the Association will liave a room before long in which to preser\'e records 
and relics. 

An account has been gi\-en of the anniversary meeting of 1884. ,\t the 
annual meeting in 1889, when East Chicago and Whiting, now thri\ing 
cities, were starting into existence, the following address was delivered to 
the children present at the Fair Ground : and believing it to be of interest to 
the children of the lamilics where this book will come, it is repeated here: 

"Beloved children, representatives of the descendants of the ]Moneers 
of Lake, some of you grandchildren and great-grandchildren of those pioneer 
settlers whose names have already, in the annals of Lake, become historic, — 
representatives also to-day of some three thottsand children in our <:ounty, — 
it is my privilege to speak to yoti for a few moments in regard to the heritage 
w-hich those pioneers and early settlers, with others who hax'e come among 
us, have left and will leave for you and those whom to-day you represent. 

"My subject is. Our Heritage to the Children. I am to represent 
therefore those men and women, venerable in age, a few of whom yet remain 
among us, who ha\e come down to us from a former generation. .\s in 
their name and in their behalf, and in behalf also of pioneer children, who 
are nr.w- between sixty and seventy years of age, I am to- speak to you to-day. 

"We are leaving, we are to leave you, this county of Lake with its 
present great resources. We found it almost a wild. We shall leave it to 
you a wealthy portion of this great commonwealth of Indiana. 



46 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

"Whether or not the Indians succeeded the Mound-Builders here, I 
do not certainly know. But I do certainly know that we took possession of 
Indian hunting grounds; of Indian homes. When the pioneers came they 
found here Indian trails and dancing floors, Indian gardens and burial 
grounds, Indian ponies and Indian life. I have been in an Indian canoe on 
the Lake of Red Cedars, have seen them eat and trade; and there are those 
yet among us who have seen them in their wigvvams and on their hunting 
grounds. We came next to the Indians here. And almost a wild, so soon 
as they were gone, were these five hundred square miles of land and water. 
We found here the prairie and the woodland, the lakes, the marshes, and 
the streams. These were then free and bridgeless streams. We have put 
bridges over them all. The only obstructions, the only dams then were 
made by the beaver. We have built dams and erected mills. The musk- 
rats made their homes in the marshes. We have turned many of these into 
meadows and corn-fields. On the southwest of Cedar Lake, where over 
a large area the sand-hill cranes waded, where the largest boats of the lake 
passed, and the best fishing ground was found for the large pike, we have 
made dry land. 

"Through the great Kankakee Marsh, where lived the muskrats and 
the mink, where the wild geese made their nests, we have cut long ditches 
witJi steam dredges and have opened up thousands of acres for pasturage 
and farming. We have fenced up all the once wild prairie, and now, where 
the deer bounded and the wolves galloped leisurely along, where the cranes 
'danced' on the high areas and the prairie hens had their nests undisturbed, 
where the wild flowers of such rich beauty grew, there are orchards and 
gardens and barnyards and dwelling houses, and the wild life of the prairie 
is no more. We ha\e ]ilantevl twenty-fi\'e towns and villages where were 
only Indian wigwams and gardens. A\'e have built forty-eight churches and 
one hun(h"ed schoolhouses. We have dug some three thousand wells of 
water. In the early times, in a dry season, it became sometimes needful 
to steal water. One spring on the west side of Cedar Lake supplied at one 
time neaily all the families around the lake. What the Indians did for 
water in the dry season I know not. They left very little. We found 
only nature here: but we shall leave to you the marks of white men on this 
soil which no coming years will erase. Lake county has been made first in 
the state 'of Indiana in railroads, first in exporting beef to foreign markets, 
first in the great oil refinery now in process of erection at \\'biting, first 
in organized Sunday-school work. And it has been placed among the first 
in exporting hay, raising horses, in the general prosperity and intelligence 
of the people. Tiiere are now some eighteen thousand people, about one-half 
living in the twenty-fi\-e towns and villages, and the other half, nine tlinusand, 
on the rich and well cultivated farms. 

"Xow, all these farms and orchards and pasture lands, all these towns 
and villages, all these manufacturing interests and industrial pursuits, all 
the material results in our public school and Sunday-school work, all this 
civilization and prosperity attained since the moccasined Indians ceased here 
to tread, we shall leave as a heritage to you, the children of this generation. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 47 

Instead of succeeding Indians, who left only trails and dancing floors and 
burial places. }0u will succeed a generation of busy workers, of intelligent 
white people, who will leave you wagon roads and railroads, bridges and 
fences, and the results of the outlay of a large amount of money and labor 
making what we call fixed capital in the land. The property in Lake county 
was assessed for taxes in 1888 at nearly nine and one-half millions of dol- 
lars. Do you see how differently you will enter upon life compared with 
your pioneer ancestry? You will ha\e no court-house, no public buildings 
to erect, few churches and few schoolhouses to build, no prairie sod to 
turn over and subdue, few fences to make, few houses to build. All these 
things have been done for you by those who struck the first blow here with 
the axe, erected the first log cabin, built the first bridge, constructed the firsi 
mill, made the first brick, sowed the first wheat and oats, and reaped the first 
harvest. 

"Can you see, beloved children ; and through you I speak as to the 
three thousand, can you see how much has been done for you by the two 
generations that have gone before you here? Some have worked in one 
line, some in another. They have all helped tO' furnish for you a rich, a valu- 
able, and, as earth is, even a glorious inheritance. Soon it will all be yours, 
for rapidly we are passing away. 

"Snow YOURSELVES WORTHY OF THIS INHERIT.-VNCE." 

Since this address was delivered to the children in i88g, those who 
have read a few preceding pages have seen that the heritage for the children 
has \'ery largely increased, more than half a million dollars having been 
invested in inipro\-ed roads, a hundred thousand dollar court house having 
been built and furnished at Hammond, the assessed value of the property 
in tlie count}' lia\-ing reached the sum of twent};-one and a half million, and 
the courity auditor's rejjort for January 1st, 1904, showing receipts for 
1903 with balance then on hand of about one million dollars. 

And now the ciuestion comes up: ^^■ho were the men of the past gen- 
eration who se\-enty years ago began to lay foundations here, and who for 
twenty, thirty, forty years, toiled on, amid privations and discouragements, 
to furnish for us the inheritance which we all now enjov? Shall we not 
honor their efforts, and count their names worthy of Listing remembrance? 
For the names of some of these men, all of whom have passed from the 
activities of life, sec in another chapter short memorial sketches. 



48 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

INTERESTING ITEMS. 

Cliurches, School Houses, Banks. 

The first church buildings erected in the county were a Methodist church 
on West Creek and a Roman Catholic chapel near the present St. John, date 
of both, 1843. In 1872 there were twenty-three church buildings, one only 
being north of the Calumet, the Lutheran church at Tolleston. There are 
now : In West Creek township three ; in Cedar Creek five ; in Winfield four ; 
in Center eight; in Hanover three: in St. Johns four: in Ross two: in Hobart 
nine: in Calumet two; and in Xnrth twenty-six. In all si.xty-si.x. 

Of schoolhouses there are one hundred and twenty, and of teachers two 
hunf'red. 

Of banks there are; In Crown Point two; Lowell has two; Dyer one; 
Hobart two ; Hammond three ; East Chicago two : \Vhiting two. Total num- 
ber fourteen. The capital inxestecl in most of these banks is owned by resi- 
dents of the county. 

Of the Lake County State Bank of East Chicago. Potter Palmer. Jr., is 
a director, vice president, and cashier, and pnjljably a large owner of the 
capital, which is advertised to be fifty thousand dollars. 

A FEW MORE P.\RTICrL.\RS. 

\\'ater. 
So far as surface water was concerned the county was originally well 
watered, \\niile not a region of rocks and rills, of springs and streams of 
crystal water, there were marshes in abundance and some flowing springs, 
which in the pioneer days usually furnished a supply for all the domestic 
animals. In these hundreds of marshes usually lived some nniskrats, some 
little fishes, and one or two ])air of wild ducks. Shallow wells were dug near 
the marshes or in low places which furnished drinking water for the families. 
But dry seasons came, marshes began to be dry. the muskrats. even, were 
driven by thirst and hunger to tlie JKiuses and stables (^f the settlers, and the 
cattle were driven to the central lake and to the large streams once a day 
for water. The surface wells also gave out. as drv seasons came and the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 49 

draining of marshes was commenced, and deeper wells were dug and walled 
uj) with brick: and at length wells were driven or bored, .so that now on 
everv large farm there is a well of some depth, a windmill to work the 
pump, and a good-sized tank to hold the water. These windmills are pic- 
turesque as well as useful. Without them it would seem almost impossible 
for the farmers to keep such large numbers, as now they do, of domestic 
animals. There are yet a few. comparati\ely. of valuable living springs in 
the county, four or five of these furnishing a large flow of water; and there 
are a very few artesian wells. The cities of the county can obtain water 
in pipes from Lake Michigan: and the larger inland towns have "water- 
works." Many of the town families ha\e their own wells and cisterns. The 
water in every part of this county, where they who use the water have wells, 
is generally good. 

Li regard to wells of water, there have been found some peculiar and 
interesting facts in the county, .^long the line of the Grand Trunk Rail- 
road west of .\insworth is the Adams' neighborhood. I qu(jte a sentence: 
"There is a strip running across that neighborhood, about three miles long and 
eighty rods wide, where good water can be obtained at a depth of from 
sixteen to eighteen feet. On each side of tliis narrow strip it is needful to 
go about forty feet to obtain water." Other peculiarities have been found. 

TOW.XSHIP ORG.\NIZ.\TIONS. 

The county now known as Lake was "erected out of the counties of Por- 
ter and Xewton" January 28. 1836, and by act of the Legislature, January 
18. 1837. it was declared to be an independent county on and after February 
t6. 1837. the day on which the writer of this was eleven years of ao-e. 

At the first meeting of the first board of County Commissioner.s the 
county was divided into three townships, Xorth, Center and South, each ex- 
tending across the county from east to west. This meeting was in April, 
1837- 

May 9, 1839. the Commissioners divided the original south township into 
three townships called \\'est Creek. Cedar Creek, and Eagle Creek townships, 



50 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

from tlie names of the creeks running" through them from nortli to south. 

In 1S43 ^^'i^field tuivnship was set off from tlie orginal Center, named, 
it is supposed, after General ^^'infield Scott. 

June 8. 1848, tlie Commissioners took olY a large strip from the north 
part of Center township, and organized St. Johns township and Ross town- 
ship, the latter taking its name from our earliest farmer settler, ^^■illialn Ross, 
a settler in 1833, and the former, probably, from John Hack, the first German 
settler. 

\\'hate\'er may have been the boundary lines of the original north town- 
ship of the county, boundaries were fixed September 5, 1849, for North town- 
ship, which Ijoundaries give that township as laid down on the map oi Herbert 
S. Ball in "Lake Countv, 1872." That map shows the ten townships as they 
were from 1853 until the Calumet township was organized. 

June 8, 1853, Hanover was taken off from Center I;y the Commissioners 
and made a separate township. The present Center t(i\vnshi]i was therefore 
left as it now is, in June. 1853. 

Hobart township was at first formed Septemlier 5. 1849, '^^t its bound- 
aries were slightly changed December 6, 1853, and the township then included 
the sections as sh(_iwn in the county map in "Lake County, 1872," the north 
part not extending beyond the Little Calumet River. March 9, 1883. its terri- 
torv was again changed, sections i and 2 in township 35 being given to it 
from Ross township and its west line, running on the west side of section 2. 
was extended up to Lake Alichigan, its east lx)undary line following the county 
line up to the lake. It was thus made fixe miles in width and eight miles long. 

A strip five miles in width, on the west side of the old North township, 
was then made a new division of the county, called North township: and !>e- 
tv.-ccn that and the new township of Hobart, a strip of territory six miles in 
width e.xtending from the north line of township 35 to Lake Michigan, was 
made a new township and called Calumet. .\s this took three sections away 
from Ross, the village of Ross is no longer, as it originally was, in Ross 
township. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 51 

Tlic three original townships of the criunty liave now hecome ele\'en, 
there lia\'ing been no other clianges since 1883. 



Red Cedar Lake or tlie Lake of tlie Red Cedars, or as more commonly 
called in Lake count}' and Ijy the railroad officials, plain Cedar Lake, has some 
interesting special history. In its original wildness it was beautiful. Job 
\\'orthington of Massachusetts, \\ho spent a summer and a winter there in 1837 
and 1838. said years afterwards that he had thought of it by day and dreamed 
of it by night, as one of the most beautiful ])laces that he had seen; and as late 
as 1879 Colonel S. B. Yeoman, of Ohio, who was deciding ujjon a line of 
railroad to run across Lake county, is reported to ha\e said that whatever 
interests in other parts of the county might be affected by the location to be 
made. Cedar Lake was "too beautiful to be left out. promising too much as 
a pleasure resort." So the proposed road was laid on the west side of the 
lake, adding nothing, however, to its laeauty, and a ])leasure resort it did 
indeed become. 

Solon Robinson spoke of the lake as being in 1834 very attractive to 
claim-seekers. Charles Wilson in tb.at summer laid a claim on the west side, 
on section 27. This soon passed into the bands of Jacob L. Brown, and l)v 
him the claim was transferred to Hervey Ball for S300. So says the Claim 
Register, date July 18, 1837. The family tradition adds, "in gold." This 
was much more than the claim was worth, but it was then considered one of 
the most desirable locations in the county. For some twentv-three years this 
place remained in the possession of the Ball family and was one of the nrom- 
inent religious, educational, and literary centers until the pioneer da^-s had 
ended. Its church, its school, its Sunday-school, its two literary societies, 
were second in influence to none in the county, .\fter the first settlers, the 
Brown, Cox. Nordyke, and Batton families sold their claims, the neighbor- 
hood which was to continue for many years was formed in 1838 by the f(;ur 
families of H. Ball. H. Sasse, Sr.. H, Von Hollen, and Louis Herlitz: and of 
these, the last, of the older members of the households, known as Mrs. H. 



52 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

\'an Hollen, lias lately passed away, eighty-seven years of age and having 
lived in the old home for sixty-five years. Younger members of the Herlitz 
familv vet remain nn what was at first the Xordyke claim, bought from that 
genuine pioneer sixty-fi\e years ago. 

On the east side nf this lake claims were located and settlements made 
in 1836 by memliers of the large Taylor families, of whom the men then in 
active life were four. Adonijah and Horace Taylor, brothers, and Dr. Calvin 
Lillev and Horace Edgerton, sons-in-law of the father, Obadiah Taylor, tlien 
quite an aged man. Records of this family will be found among memorial 
sketches. These faiuilies gave considerable attention to saw-mill Iniilding and 
to fishing. 

On the southwest side of the lake were the two regular fisherman fam- 
ilies of Lyman i\Iann and Jonathan Gray. They soon left that side of the 
lake. 

A PLE.\SURE RESORT. 

From tlie very first of the settlements in the county this lake had been a 
favorite place to visit for fishing and recreation by small parties from the 
growing neighborhoods ; but after cars commenced running on the new road 
in the spring of 1881, that it would become a large pleasure resort was evident. 

In April, 1881, Captain Harper, a Lake county man. who had learned 
to manage a boat on Lake ^Michigan, put a small sailing vessel on this lake. 
It would carry about twenty passengers. Excursion trains soon commenced 
running, many row boats were ])ut on the lake, man\- improvements to accom- 
modate pleasure seekers followed, a se\en hundred dollar steamer was put on 
the lake in 1883, and one worth twelve hundred dollars in 1884. Other sail 
Ixjats also came into use. As early as 1884 about two hundred boats of dififerent 
kinds were on the waters of this lake, and from three to fi\e thousand people 
would sometimes be visiting the lake in the same week. Since then build- 
ings have been erected on both sides of the lake and every summer there are 
thousands of visitors. Almost entirely in these later years has that Lake of the 
Red Cedars been given up to the devotees of pleasure in the summer time. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 56 

and in the winter to the ice Inisiness when busy men fill the Armoiu" and other 
large ice houses. 

REM.AIXS OF MAN. 

Before taking final leave of this lake there is one more item of interest 
to be recorded. On the first day of October. 1880. two young men. Orlando 
Russell and Frank Russell, Cdmmcnced excavations for a mill foundation. 
The spot thev had selected was a lieautiful grassy knoll, a very sunny spot, a 
few feet higher than the sandv lake lieach. sloping slightly in e\'ery direction. 
It had l)een, the summer before, a camping ground for many days and nights 
of a pleasure party, who did not dream as they reposed upon that turf, what 
dust was slumbering a very few feet beneath their heads. 

\\'hen on that Octolier morning the work of excavation commenced an 
unexpected discovery was made. It was found that the top of that mound 
was artificial, so soon as the surface soil was removed, and as the ])low- 
share cut into the second laver of earth it struck a mass of human bones, 
evidently entire skeletons, until the plow reached them, of human Ijeings and in 
a good state of preservation. As many as twenty skeletons were taken out 
from a small space of ground, and a tree, under the \ery roots of which some of 
them were found, gave evidence that they were buried there, apparentlv in 
one promiscuous heap, two hundred years ago. 

L.-\RGE LAND HOLDERS. 

In 1872, about twenty years after railroads began to cross Lake county, 
the following areas of land were held liy the following named persons: Non- 
residents of the county: Dorsey & Cline. atout 12.000 acres; Forsyth, 8,000; 
G. W. Cass, 9,577; J. B. Niles, about 1.800; Dr. Hittle, 1,200; D. C. Sco- 
field. i.ooo. Residents: A. N. Hart. 15.000: J. W. Dinwiddie estate, about 
3,500; Wellington A. Clark. 1.320. In all, 53.500 acres. 

Calling the area of the county, wet land and all, five hundred sections, the 
Claim Register says : 'This county contains 508 sections of land, about 400 
of w'hich are dry, tillable ground" — and considering each section to contain 
640 acres, there are, then, in the county 320,000 acres ; and, according to the 



54 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

figures given aljove. in 1872 the representatives of onlv ten families held Due- 
sixth part of the area of the county. Tliirty years have made cpiite a change 
in those ten families, and all those tracts of land have heen more or less divided 
up. The Lake Agricultural Company. President W. R. Shelby of Michigan, 
still holds cjuite a portion of the G. \\'. Cass land, and William Xiles. Esq., of 
La Porte, still holds quite a large amount of the J. B. Niles land. The other 
tract of land now held by non-residents lies on Lake ^lichigan cornering on 
Tolleston. comprising about 4,000 acres. Real owners unknown. 

Soldiers of Lake County. 

Some mention is justly due, beyond what has yet been made, of the men 
and young men, some of them scarcely more than boys, who so readily left 
their homes, 

"To march o'er field and to watch in tent," 
to fight for their country, and perhaps to die. But of the more than a thou- 
sand that probably went from the "Homes of Lake," and of the two hundred 
or UT ire that never returned, of only a few can memorials lie recorded here. 

There are on one Lake county roll, taken from Volume VIII of the Ad- 
jutant General's Report, the names of nineteen who died, members of Com- 
pany G of the Twelfth Cavalry, nineteen who were members of Company B 
of the Twentieth Regiment; of twenty who were in Company A, Seventy- 
third Regiment: and t\\enty members of Company A of the Xinety-ninth 
Regiment. 

The following are some records concerning a few. Were the material 
ample it is evident that some selection must be made or the war record alone 
would make a quite large volume. 

Colonel John Wheeler. — Born in Connecticut, February 6, 1S25, 
spending the years of youth and early manhood in Ohio, married in 1846 to 
Miss Ann C. Jones, a daughter of John D. Jones, himself the son of Johnson 
Wheeler, who was the father of seven children, in 1847 the ^^'heeler and Jones 
families becoming residents in Lake county, the home of John Wheeler was 
for about si.x years in West Creek township. In 1853 he was appointed or 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 55 

elected county surveyor, holding the office for three years, l-'or the next four 
years he was associated with Zerah F. Summers in editing and publishing the 
Crown Point Register. In iS6i he raised a company of one hundred men, 
was chosen Captain, his company becoming a part of the Twentieth Regiment 
of Indiana Volunteers. February i6, 1862, he was commissioned Major, and 
in March, 1863, Colonel. "In July, as Colonel of the Twentieth Indiana Regi- 
ment, he led his veteran troops on that bloody and decisive field of Gettys- 
burg, and there fell on July 2d in the slaughter of that terrible conflict." 

Colonel \\'heeler's line of genealogy, traced backward, is the following: 
His father, Johnson Wheeler, who removed from Connecticut to Ohio in 
1824, and who became a resident of Lake county in 1847, was born in 1797, 
and was the son of Johnson Wheeler, born in 1754, who was a son of Samuel 
Wheeler and Ruth Stiles WHieeler. Ijorn in 171 2. who was a son of John 
Wheeler, born in 1684, who was a son of John Wheeler, of Woodbury, who 
died in 1704, date of birth not known, who was a son of John WHieeler, who 
settled in Fairfield, Connecticut, in 1644, and had resided in Conc(5rd before 
1640, Date of migration from England not known. 

Ruth Stiles, wife of Samuel \Mieeler, and so the great-grandmother of 
Colonel \Mieeler, was a daughter of Benjamin Stiles, of which New England 
Stiles family Dr. Stiles of Yale College was a member : and as Dorcas Burt, 
of the noted Burt family of Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1658 was married 
to John Stiles of this same family of which Dr. Ezra Stiles was a member, 
the probability is that Ruth Stiles was a descendent through Dorcas Burt of 
Flenry and Eulalia Burt, who came from England also "before 1640." 

To one who traces lines of genealogy, it is singular how many of the 
earliest New England families have been, in some generation, connected by 
marriage. And that those first early families should have intermarried is 
natural. One line from that same Henry and Eulalia Burt goes down to 
that noted man. Grover Cleveland. It is certain that there were eight Burt 
daughters who were married and had many descendants, and it is claimed that 
there were eleven sons. No man can choose his ancestry ; and no man can be 
sure of what sort will be his descendants. 



56 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Stillmax a. Robbins. — In marked contrast with the foregoing record 
of one who liad led veteran troops in brilhant and bloody battles, is placed a 
memorial of a soldier youth. It is copied from a publication of 1864. 
"Died. In Huntsville. Alabama, July 18. 1864, Stillman A. Robbins, of 
Company G, Twelfth Indiana Cavalry, aged 22 years and 8 months. There 
are those who recollect, a few years ago, a bright little bqy, deeply interested 
in mastering that key to knowledge, the magic alphabet: then, in early boy- 
hood, leaving the sports of other children, and stealing away by himself with 
his favorite books, treasuring with care a neglected Sunday-school library; 
then in the academy the attenti\-e scholar, winning the love of teachers and 
classmates by obedience and politeness: and soon again in the business of 
life with a mechanical taste Ijecoming a skillful engineer: and they saw in the 
child, the boy, and the man, a characteristic nobleness, manliness, and energy, 
that e\'er attracted attention, and won respect and love. 

"In November, 1863, when returning after a five months' absence, the 
3^oung engineer finding a cavalry company recruiting in his neighliorhood, 
after spending but a few hours under his parents" roof, enrolled himself as a 
volunteer. 

"Soon after the organization of the regiment he was detailed as clerk in 
the adjutant's oflice. where he soon won the confidence and esteem of all the 
officers in the regiment by his attention to business and soldierly conduct. At 
Huntsville he was again detailed as chief clerk in the provost marshal's 
office, which position he filled for a month with great credit, when he was 
taken with a fever from which he was just recovering, when a hemorrhage 
suddenly closed his career. 

"He sleeps where 'southern vines are dressed above the noljle slain," none 
the less a martyr to his country than if he had wrapped his colors round his 
breast in some blood-red field of battle; and there is no nobler grave than 
that of a patriot soldier. His loss was deeply felt by all the regiment — 'talk 
not of grief till you have seen the tears of warlike men" — but who shall speak 
of the loss to those parents who had given up their two brave boys, their all, 
without a murmur, to their countrv? — C. Ball."" 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 57 

The writer of the record just copied was Lieutenant Charles Ball, him- 
self a member of tlie Twelfth Cavalry, who "was detailed to serve as a staff 
officer, and was appointed sergeant-major." a position which "kept him gen- 
erally at the headquarters of the regiment." 

He sent to his Cedar Lake home very interesting letters, but they are too 
lengthv to be reproduced here. Some of them are in a publication called 
"The Lake of the Red Cedars." 

One incident only will be given here of his many experiences. There was 
assigned to him at Hnntsville a somewhat dangerous duty. He had taken 
from his home the best horse for cavalry service that he could find, a good 
and easv trax-eller and \-ery hardy. "Mounted on this hardy and faithful ani- 
mal the sergeant-major started from the headquarters and passed out of 
Hnntsville alone to carrv orders. He knew not what moment the aim of a 
concealed foe would be upon him, but proceeding upon a gentle gallop, he 
slacked not rein nor did his trusty steed break his pace, till a ride of about 
twenty miles was accomplished." It had not the excitement of Sheridan's 
famous ride, but perhaps it was more dangerous. 

Miles F. ]\IcCartv. — Another member of the Twelfth Cavalry was 
Miles F.. usually called Franklin. McCarty. He was the third son of Judge 
Benjamin McCarty. of \^'est Point, a member of a pioneer family of La Porte. 
of Porter, and of Lake counties. He was talented and ambitious. He had 
capabilities which would have de\-eloped nobly under favorable circumstances, 
but by some means he was not in the line of promotion. He was taken sick 
at Nashville, or on the way there: and died at Nashville. May 27. 1864. His 
death was more than usually sad. Four members of Coinpany G died at 
Nashville. 

George \\'. Edgertox. — Of two members of Company B who fell at 
Gettysburg with their Colonel on that bloody field. Jidy 2, 1863. one was 
George W. Edgerton, a member of a true pioneer family and a young patriot 
soldier. He was a son of Amos Edgerton, a grandson of Horace Edgerton, 
and was connected with the large Taylor family of pioneers of East Cedar 



58 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Lake. He was a promising youth, and his loss, like that of thousands of 
others, was a great grief to a fond mother who has herself long since passed 
to the peaceful shore. Her son fell in one of the greatest decisive battles of 
the world. 

M. Gr.wes. — Another youth \\hose life was given for his country was 
M. Graves, son of Oi-rin W. Gra\es, of West Creek. He was a member of 
Company A, Seventy-third Regiment, and died at Nashville, December i6. 
1862. He was a mild and pleasant boy, too young to bear the exposures of a 
soldier's life. 

Nashville seems to have been a fatal place for our soldiers. The record 
states that of the Seventy-third there died at Nash\-ille Lewis Atkins, Novem- 
ber 22, 1862; Eli Atwood. November 29, 1862: E. Woods. November 29, 
1862; Albert Nichols, December i, 1862: John Childers, December 3. 1862; 
William Frazier. December 15, 1862: A. Lamphier. January 7, 1863; James 
Roney, February 8. 1863: L. ^Morris. April 30, 1863: T. ^^'. Loving, Sep- 
tember 30, 1863; of the Twelfth Cavalry, W. M. Pringle. November 4. 1864; 
\\'illiam Harland. January 8, 1865; William Stinkle. February i. 1865; be- 
sides M, F. McCarty and ]\L Graves, specially named. 

Captain Alfred Fry. — Among those who returned from ^Mexico in 
1848 was Alfred Fry of Crown Point, fifteen years older than when he first 
became a soldier, who enlisted as a private July 26. 1862, and was mustered 
into the service of the L'nited States as Orderly Sergeant of Company A, 
Seventy-third Regiment of Indiana Volunteers, August 16, 1862. September 
1st of the same year at Lexington, Ky.. he was commissioned Second 
Lieutenant of Company A. The regiment returning to Louisville he was as- 
signed to the position of Brigade Commissary. December 2d be was com- 
missioned First Lieutenant and engaged in the battle of Stone River. He 
was under fire for si.x days. January 19. 1863. he was commissioned Cap- 
tain of Company A. His regiment was assigned to Colonel Streight's brig- 
ade and surrendered in "May. 1863. in that disastrous attempt of about fifteen 
hundred men to pass through North .\labama to Rome, in Georgia. Cap- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 59 

tain Fry"? narrative of the treatment the otficers of the Seventy-third Regi- 
ment received, after they had surrendered on lionorable conditions, was pub- 
lished in full in "Lake County, 1872," and presents a very dark picture of 
man's inlninianity to man. 

For one vear thev endured the horrors of Libl)}- Prison, and for about 
one more year were removed from one prison pen to another. Finally they 
were paroled, February 14, 1865, and in ]\Lirch entered the Union lines. 
Captain Fry was in a few weeks exchanged, returned to his company, then 
in Alabama, was discharged in the summer with his regiment, and became 
again a resident of Crown Point, where he continued to live, engaged in the 
peaceful pursuits of life, until 1873. 

Captain John AL Foster. — Of Company G, Twelfth Cavalry, Juhn M. 
Foster became Captain, promoted from First Lieutenant. His brother, Al- 
mon Foster, was the iirst captain. They were sons of Frederick Foster, of 
Crown Point, and brothers of ]\Irs. John Pearce, of Eagle Creek. Unlike 
the infantry regiments, the Twelfth Cavalry was sent into no great battles 
and the officers and men had no opportunity to gain promotion through 
deeds of valor; but the regiment performed a large amount of cavalry ser- 
vice. Colonel Karge, of the Second New Jersey, who commanded in the 
course of the war several different regiments, is reported, in a letter written 
June II. 1865, to have said that the Twelfth Indiana was the best regiment 
he ever commanded. 

After the war closed. Captain Foster returned to Crown Point and en- 
gaged again in the peaceful pursuits of business life. Sons and daughters 
grew up in his home. He was a worthy citizen: was quite successful in 
business; and lived tmtil February, 1893, rejoicing in the prosperity of a 
united nation. 

As this cavalry regiment gained no distinguished war honors, as the in- 
fantry regiments did, it seems just to quote a few statements from the report 
of the Adjutant General of Indiana, see Vol. Ill, showing that its members 
accomplished a large amount of soldier work in various wavs, in North Ala- 



60 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

bama. in Tennessee, in Soutli Alabama and Florida, and (j\er n.iany hundreds 
of miles of southern territory. Out from Hnnts\ille as a center the men 
"were emjiloyed \ery extensively in fighting' and ridding the country of guer- 
rillas and 'bushwhackers." in which numerous skirmishes and engagements 
were fought." In September, 1864, the regiment was removed to Tulla- 
homa, Tennessee, and there constantly employed against General Forrest's 
forces. They went to South Alabama and into Florida, fighting, skirmish- 
ing, doing different dut_\' from what infantry could do. "The regiment was 
highly and specially complimented by IMajor General Grierson, in a letter to 
Governor Morton, for its gallant conduct and military discijiline." No one 
reading the full report of the Adjutant General could reasonaljly think that 
the members of Company G failed to do their duty. As to what to do a sol- 
dier has little choice. 

Captain D.xniel F. Sawyer. — Officers as well as men in the ranks fell 
victims to the sickness incident to camp life and to climate. Daniel F. Saw- 
yer, the first captain of Company A, of the Ninety-ninth, was taken sick and 
died in Mississippi, and was succeeded in command by K. M. Burnham. Cap- 
tain Sawyer was from Merrilh-ille, and his body was lirought home and laid 
away to sleep in the INIerrillville cemetery. 

Lieutenant John P. Merrill. — One of the sons of Dudley ^Merrill, of 
Merrillville, John P. ^ilerrill was born October 13, 1843. I" August, 1862, 
he enlisted in Company A, of the Ninety-ninth Regiment, and in October, 
1864, was promoted from the office of Sergeant to that of First Lieutenant. 
He returned home in June, 1865, and became a merchant. In 1867 be was 
married to ]\Iiss ?ilartba T. Randolph. He was for many years Trustee of 
Ross township, and at lenglb, having been elected County Treasurer, lie re- 
moved to Crown Point. Spending several years of life as an active, useful 
citizen of Crown Point, he died there suddenly "at 5 o'clock Sunday evening, 
February 21," 1897. 

Immediately following the record of his death is the following record : 
"Ca])tain W. S. Babbitt was liorn in Vermont, December 19, 1825. When 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 61 

eleven years of age lie went to sea. Sailed five times around Cape Horn and 
made three voyages on a whaling vessel. Came to Ross township in 1854. 
A\'as a soldier in our army in that great conflict, and died, at Crown Point, 
on the next daw Fehruary 22. one of our national anniversary days. .\ge, 71 
years." The "next da}-" in the record here (|uoted means the day after the 
death of Lieutenant Merrill. Like him he was Lieutenant in Company B, of 
the Twentieth, Init was transferred to Company C and was promoted Captain. 
He also remo\ed to Crown Point, where he spent with his family the later 
years of his life. He did not forget God in the days of peace, of whom he 
could say as king Davitl once said, "Thou hast covered my head in the day 
of hattle." hut was an active member of the Methodist E])iscopal church. 

Such are a few brief memorials of our loyal anil gallant soldier dead. 
There were many others, perhaps not cjuite so well and widely kncnvn as 
these., who were e(|ually dear to their special kindred and friends, and of 
these others a small xdIuuic of memorials might be collected. 

Of the Twelfth Cavalry there fell in battle or died, at Xew Orleans. 
Henry Brockman and .Sidney W. Chapman; at Kendalhille, Charles Croth- 
ers. l'"red Kable, and .Mliert Moore; at Vicksburg, Jacob Deeter; at home, R. 
L. Indler, !•'. S. ]\Iiller, William Stubby, and Ezra Wedge; at .Starkxille. 
Ephraim \\. (ioff; at Huntsxille, M. Hoopendall; at ^lichigan City. A. Mc- 
Millen : making with those elsewdiere named sixteen of whom no memorials 
are here given. But their names will live and their deeds are on record. 

Of the Twentieth. Company B, there fell in battle or died, Horace Ful- 
ler, Wilderness; Lawrence Frantz, Spottsylvania ; John ( Iriesel, David Island; 

3.J. Hafey, I^ittsburg; C. Hazworth, ; William Johnson, Petersburg; 

Albert Kale, Camp Hampton; William Mutchler, Camp Smith; P. Mutch- 
ler. Washington; James !\lerrill, Wilderness; S. Pangburn, Anderson\-ille; 

C. Potter, ; D. Pinkerton, ; J. Richmond, Gettysburg; John !•". 

Farr. Washington; Isaac Williams, Charles Winters, City Point. Sexenteen 
names without memorials. 

Of the Seventy-Uiird, Company A, the names not already given in the 



62 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Nashville list are these : John H. Easley, Stone River ; R. W. Fuller, Indi- 
anapolis : J. j\I. Fuller. Gallatin : I. \\'. Moore. ^I. Vincent, Gallatin ; John 
INIaxwell, Scottsville; C. Van Burg, Bowling Green; E. \\'elch, Stone River: 

5. ^^'hite, Blount's Farm. Nineteen names in all, of this company, with no 
memorial sketch. 

Of the Ninety-ninth, Company A, the names are: O. E. Atkins, D. T. 
Burnham; J. Bartholomew and H. H. Haskins at Andersonville; J. D. 
Clinghan at Huntsville : H. A. Case at La Grange; James Foster and James 
Horton at Atlanta : R. T. Harris and T. C. Pinnel at La Grange: John Lorey, 
Adam Mock, N. Newman, at Black River: Corydon Pierce at \^■ashington ; 
Albert Robbins, a lirother of Stillman Robbins of the Twelfth, dying August 

6, 1864; J. Schmidt, Indianapolis; and J. Stickleman, A. \"andervert. and 
M. Vv'inand, the last one dying "at home," December 11, 1864. Of this com- 
panv are also nineteen names. 

Seventy-one names are thus here given following the ele\'en mem()rial 
sketches. Patriot soldiers all. 

This writer gives no sketches of the living. 

A soldier's monument. 

In 1903 the citizens of the three southern townships. Eagle Creek, 
Cedar Creek, and \\'est Creek, inchuling as quite central the town of Lowell, 
determined to erect a monument to perpetuate on lasting stone the names, if 
not all the deeds, of their brave sons who engaged in the great conflict which 
commenced in 1861. 

It is understood that the monument is to cost three thousand dollars, tlie 
money mostly, perhaps all, raised by the efforts of the public-spirited w^omen 
of those townships. It is to stand on the public square at Lowell. 



I 



--iSCW 




SOLON ROBINSON 



<»y r y^ ^ y y /■ j^ y y^ ^ ^ 

S 

N JVOAH 



i\OBi.f:, 



\ 
S 



} r<l\(| will' \MV MMiTHtsr I'KI sr MS ^//jjf\' 

\Vlll,i;l.A;i, 11 has boea ccrl.li.il tft JiK' h; till pi"Pjr M.th'.rili I'll .1 t . .'./ 
i« il«!tod t<r»le offitu of ^^%'. < '-■ ///. r^.'.-iit' r!./,'- I,., ilK .i.ui.lj .11 ' 

r«USJUUejt» «.ro n* VE. That in tht' n;.i»<' i^nWhr^li' ...iIIi.imIv nl Ih. ...mI -li.lr. I ,l,i hc-n-hy colunu^'M>u bim, 
Ltb*»Aiii*'^«^* ^/r>v,, ^^^^ ^/>,'y^^, -V- 1. w-^ ,/. . . l..r lh.-<a.il . "'ii.l 



finr^li tefU t^yv t^ f ' jrcHn from ^^., 

I.N TESTIMONY WlIEtKOI-, I h;,>.- I„ ,.,o, i l,.„i,l. aad cau.e<l lo bi- affixed | 

theaealof th'- ilnt.'.M lndiaiAi.l.« tht / ,- '<v. , -!<vot ,. i^/J^, 

III Ihf- 1. u- of ..111- Ui»d unt. tfti.- mil i (L If lii.ii.liiil im.l Unit v . . / /-. tho 

,'vi* wl lilt: »latu, aud oj' lh«j|p^].. ml. m . .,( Hi,; ImttJ :ji,,ti , th.' (i'^t, / 




SOLON ROBINSON'S COMMISSION 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY, 



03 



CHAPPTER III. 

Memorial Sketches of Early Settlers. 

Note. — I propose not to arrange these in alphabetical order, aUhuugh that 
order is very convenient for a reader if there is no index ; nor yet alto- 
gether in chronological order; but rather in an order in which one name 
seems to suggest another. — T. H. B. 

There is much material for memorial sketches of some of the earl\- resi- 
dents of Lake county, those who are called its pioneer settlers: there is scantv 
material for biographies of others. Some men ha\e written their names in a 
bold hand, like the name. John Hancock, on the Declaration of Independence, 
w ithin the history and across the history of Lake county. 

Among these is the name. SoLox Robinson. He was born in Connecti- 
cut, October 21, 1803. And the more closely one studies the biographical 
history of Lake county. Indiana, so much the more fully he will see that Lake 
county, like many other portions of this Union, owes verv much, for its intelli- 
gence and enterprise, to New England blood and New England training. Of 
the earlier life of Solon Robinson, of his education and his experiences, not 
much is now known. He left his native State rather early in life, and from 
which of the larger Robinson families he was descended tloes not seem to be 
known, but in May, 1828, he was married in Cincinnati, Ohio, and not long 
after became a citizen of Indiana, first at Madison, and then in Tennings 
county, at a place called Rock Creek. What business pursuits he followed 
seems to be also unknown. In October, 1834, in a conveyance drawn by 
oxen, ha\-ing one extra wagon or more to convey the household goods, he 
came with his wife and two young children, and probalily two young men, 
Jerome Curtis and J. B. Curtis, over that long line of road that was then 
leading up into Northwestern Indiana. The road way. except Indian trails, 
ended in Porter county ; but he found there Jacob Huriburt to guide him to 



64 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tlie newly surveyed land lying" yet further west. Just before sunset October 
31, 1834. this leader of migration with his ])arty, having crossed, what was to 
him and to them a wonderful sight, a beautiful lielt of prairie, reached some 
skirting woodland. The next morning he concluded to locate there his future 
home, and from that November morning tuitil about 1850 his name is quite 
closely interwo\en with all that followed in the settlement and growth. So 
fully was he concerned in the afifairs of the young county that he was called 
the Squatter King of L.\ke. He made a map of the cijunty, showing, be- 
sides other features, what was prairie and what was woodland, he secured the 
organization of the Squatters' L'nion, July 4, 1836, and was elected the first 
Register of claims. [That old Claim Register is now in my possession: also 
a copy of the Robinson maj), probably the only cojjy now in Lake county. — 
T. H. B.] He was an early Justice of the Peace, was the first postmaster in 
the county, was elected the first County Clerk, and, with his brother Milo 
Robinson, opened the first settlers" store in the county. He secured the loca- 
tion of the county seat at Crown Point in 1840. He was fond of writing and 
had quite an agricultural turn of nn'nd. He commenced writing for tlie Culti- 
vator, at least as early as 1837. In 1838 he proposed the organization of an 
"American .Society of Agriculture." In 1841 he .sent out an address to the 
farmers of the United States, through the columns of the Cultivator. The 
journeys wdiich he took over the country in behalf of his plan cannot be de- 
tailed here. His efforts probably led on to the Grange movement. He also 
wrote stories, such as "The Will." "The Last of the Bufi'aloes," "Hot Corn," 
"Green Mountain Girls," and others. He was connected for a time with the 
New York Tribune. He went at length to Florida and there died in 1880. 
His older daughter, Mrs. Strait, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, re- 
side in Crown Point, and, like him, have talent and intelligence, and, like 
him, some of them hold otTice, 

George Earle was born in Falmouth, England, date of birth not 
known. He became a resident of the city of Philadelphia, and came to the 
town of Liverpool, on Deep Ri\er, in 1836. That (ince noted town was on 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 65 

land selected under an Indian float. ] 'resident Andrew Jackson, in June, 
]836, - — see co])y of patent in tiie county Recorder's office — conveyed to John 
B. Chapman one section of land. George Earle was talented like Solon Rob- 
inson. He was a cultivated Englishman. He had means. He did not be- 
come a squatter. He soon liecame prominent among the settlers. He began 
to secure Indian lands. He sought for the location of the county seat at Liv- 
erpool in 1840, but in this was not successful. After the location at what 
Solon Robinson had named Lake Court House, he, with Solon Robinson, 
named the place Crown Point, a name which he evidently suggested. He 
was appointed immediately County Agent and performed well the duties as- 
signed to him in that relation. He continued for a time to improve his town 
of Liver[X)ol, Ixtught more lancl. securing at length in that ])art of the county 
some ten or twelve sections. He commenced building a mill, at what Ijecame 
the town of Hobart, in 1845, removed with his family, a wife and one son, to 
that place in 1847. Laid out the town in 1848. In 1854 he returned to 
Philadelphia, leaving his son, John Earle, now considered a millionaire in 
Chicago, to manage the interests in Lake county. He returned to England, 
for a visit, in 1855, again in 1865, and yet again in 1868. He caused to be 
erected there a home for tiie ])oor and aged of his native town, which cost 
thirty thousand dollars, and this he gave to the town. He also visited Lake 
county, erected an art gallery in Hobart in 1858, and placed upon the walls 
about three hundred pictures which he himself had painted in Philadelphia. 
It was said of him in 1872: "He is tall in person, dignified and courteous in 
manners, manifesting the Ijearing of an American anrl English gentleman." 
His name is fully written in the early history of the county, and his influence 
will long be felt. 

Bexjamin McCarty. The third competitor for the county seat in 1840, 
may well be named next. His individuality was as marked and distinct as was 
that of the other two. Like theirs his family influence in the county yet re- 
mains. The place of his birth, the time of his birth, his lineage, are alike un- 
known. He is first found, having come from an older county in Indiana, as 



66 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

■the acting sheriff of La Porte county in 1832. As Probate Judge he solem- 
nized marriages there in 1833 and 1834. In 1836, having chosen in Porter 
county a central position, he secured there, on his land, the location of the 
Porter county seat. Xot satisfied to remain tliere he came with his large fam- 
ily into Lake county, obtained what was known as the Lilley place, where had 
been a hotel and a store, laid out a town, named it West Point, and, in 1840, 
made effort to secure the Lake county seat. In this he failed. He was not in 
the geographical center, as, ver_\- nearly, Solon Robinson was. His oldest son, 
E. S. McCarty, reopened the store and also, in 1840. made brick, putting uji 
the first brick kiln burned in the county. Changes in population took jilace 
and Judge McCarty remo\ed to the prairie a few miles south, Iiought what is 
now the Hill place, and became a farmer. He had six sons. E. Smilex'. Wil- 
liam Pleasant. Franklin. Fayette .\sb.ury, Morgan, Jonathan, and two daugh- 
ters. Hannah and Candace. He had for bis older sons some of the finest 
saddle horses then in the county. His home at West Point was a center in 
1840 for religious meetings, and, for a short time, for a literary society. 
Some of bis sons were teachers in the jniblic schools. Until bis death the 
family influence was large, but after that the family scattered, one si_in only 
remaining in the countv. Some of his descendants are living in Creston. 

judge McCarty was friendly, intelligent, a man who knew something oi 
frontier life before be reached Lake county, and was a man of good position 
in social life. Of those who knew him intimately none are living now. 

Dr. H. D. Palmer is considered to ha\e been the first graduate or regu- 
lar physician of the county. He was a graduate of a medical college in Fair- 
field, New York, in 1834, and in the winter of 1836 he located as a physician 
two miles west of the present town of ]\Ierrill\illc. He also commenced farm- 
ing life, combining the two very successfully. He did yet more. He was elected 
Associate Judge in 1838. and held this office with Judge Clark and afterward 
with Judge Samuel Turner for about thirteen years. It is said that twice in 
this term of years, in the absence of the presiding judge, he conducted the en- 
tire business of the court. Ordinarily the associate judges of those years did 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 67 

\ery little real court l:iisiness. Tlic}- were not expected to be thor(^^lt;i^ly 
versecl in law. Their judgnient was consulted on matters between man and 
man. In 1841 Dr. Palmer erected the first frame dwelling house in that part 
of the county. As a physician his rides extended from D}-er to H<ibart and 
Lake Station. His most extensixe practice was in the years between 1850 
and i860. He continued his farming life and in connection with Solon Rob- 
inson brought the first Berkshire pigs to Crown Point. 

He was twice married, .\fter the death of his first wife, who was the 
mother of one son and one daughter, he was married to Miss Catherine Lender- 
wood, a sister of John L'nderwood, the poet of Lake county. Miss Hattie 
Palmer, druggist at Hebron, is one of her daughters, and the other is Mrs. 
Alice Feiler, of Winfield. Both share in the Palmer and Underwood talent. 
Mrs. Palmer lives at Hebron with her daughter. Dr. Palmer Iniilt a fine 
country residence on his farm about 1870. 

In this home of intelligence and of abundance was brought up an ado]:)ted 
son. Dr. S. W. Johns, the son of J. V. Johns, the latter elected Sheriff in 
1839, a young pioneer from Philadelphia as early as 1836, who possessed an 
excellent counting-house education. His name soon disappears from the 
early records, and it is supposed that he had Imt little opportunity to use his 
good abilities. But the son, S. W. Johns, studied medicine in Dr. Palmer's 
office, settled as a physician at Dyer, was jirosperous in his practice, and, in 
the midst of his life of usefulness, was unexpectedly called away from the ac- 
ti\-ities of life, leaving a wife. Mrs. Johns of Dyer, and a young daughter. 
Katie Johns, now residents of Zion City. 

John Wood came into this region, looked over the land, and made a 
claim in 1835. He spent one night, in making examination of land, with Dr. 
Ames, of }ilichigan City, and three or four others, in the cabin of Jessie Pierce 
on the bank of Turkey Creek. His visit thus affording evidence that Jesse 
Pierce was a settler there as early as 1835. Joh" Wood was a native of east- 
ern Massachusetts. He returned home and came with his family in 1836, 
leaving Michigan City on July 4th of that year. "He found that during his 



68 HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 

absence General Tipton of Fort W'ayiie, United States senator, had laid a float 
upon his claim in the name of Indian Ouashma." The land was suitable for 
a mill seat, and so according to law or usage was not properly subject to an 
Indian float. But the float had been laid and laid by a senator; the location 
was very much wanted by the claimant, and so he purchased the land from the 
Indian, paving him for the quarter section one thousand dollars, instead of 
])aving to the Governmerit. as he had exiiected, two hundred dollars. The 
deed with Ouashma's signature must still be in the possession of some of the 
Wood family. In 1837 a ^aw mill was erected there, and in a year or two 
more a grist mill, which for some years did a large amount of grinding for 
the farmers of both Lake and Porter counties. The place was soon known 
as \\'ood"s Mill, but its proper name now is W'oodvale. The Wood family 
home, at first on the east side of the river ( where also the family cemetery 
now is), but in a few years remo\ed to the west side of that river, was a very 
pleasant home for the children that grew up there, and for friends who visited 
there. 

The fotinders of that home have passed away, but a large flottring mill 
is stifl where the Indian float was laid, and in W'oodvale. in Hobart, and in 
Valparaiso, are many descendants to show the results in character and l:)usi- 
ness life of the A\'ood family of Massachusetts. 

While genuine pioneers they never l^ecame "squatters." as they located 
in 1836. three years before the Land Sale, not on Government land, but on 
land purchased from an Indian. Xot man\- "floats" were located in Lake 
county, but there were a few that caused to white settlers considerable dis- 
appointment. The line of descent of this family, gnes back to Moses Wood, 
born in 1748. who had three sons and eight daughters, the youngest of the 
eleven children being John Wood, liorn October 28, 1800, and then to 
Nathan Wood, born in 1721. and then to Jacob \\"ood, the date of whose 
birth is not exactly known. He was probably the second of the line born in 
America. One of the nine children of Xathan \\"ood. son of Jacob Wood, 
was named Sarah, and two dates are found for her birth. The one is 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 



6 'J 



October jth, tlie otlier October 21st. of 1750. As Xew Style commenced 
in England in 1752 tbe 3d of September of that year being called by Act of 
Parliament the 14th day, the change from Old Style to New may have led 
to some confusion in the Wood family record. The 7th of October O. S. 
would properly have been October i8th N. S. No child was born in Old 
England or Xew between September 3d and September 14th, in 1752, as 
no such days e.xisted in English records and history. 




Hervey Ball, a descendant of Francis Ball, of West Springfield, Mas- 
sachusetts, of Jonathan Ball, born in T645, of Benjamin Ball, 1689. of 
Charles Ball, 1725, of Lieutenant Charles Ball. 1760, was born in the old 
town of West Springfield, now Holyoke, October 16, 1794. He was a 
graduate of Middlebury College, Vermont, of the year 18 18, studied law in 
Vermont for two years, and in 1820 made his first home in Columbia county, 
Georgia, a member of what was called the Augusta Bar. Here he practiced 
law till 1834, and was for a time Colonel of a cavalry compairy and attended 



70 HISTORY OF LARK COUNTY. 

the musters of tlie Georgia state militia. lia\ing always fine horses in his 
possession. 

In 1836 he was at City West in Porter county, Indiana, laying out town 
lots as surveyor for a company who were proposing to start a city. In the 
spring of 1837 he brought his famih- from Massachusetts to City West; 
but in July he bought a claim at the Red Cedar Lake in Lake C(iunt}-, and 
before the year 1S37 closed the family settlement had there been fully made. 
Through the remainder oi his life, now torty-tb.ree years of age and a retired 
lawyer, he gave much attention to farming and to keeping honey bees and 
raising some choice domestic animals. He held for some time the office 
of County Surveyor, also of Probate Judge, and in his later years was Jus- 
tice of the Peace. He was Clerk of the Cedar Lake Baptist church. Super- 
inten.dent of the Sabbath school at the feke for many years. Clerk and also 
^Moderator of the Northern Indiana Baptist Association, and a trustee of 
Franklin College. In his college and in his professional life he had mingled 
to quite a large extent with the gay. and the busy, and the culti\'ated, was 
familiar with leading men of Georgia, and knew what life was among the 
wealthy planters of that day. The results of his New England training 
and of his Southern professional life were of large benefit to his children 
and the young people connected with them ; and bis home became and con- 
tinned to be for se\'eral vears a religious, an educational, a literar}-, and a 
social center. Ministers of different denominations found there a welcome, 
and the home was aiwa}s full of health fr.l life. The Puritanic and the true 
\\'estern spirit blended \\eH together. The family library was cjuite large, 
large for pioneer days, and periodicals, agricultural and political, literary 
and religions, found their way to the home in ribundance, so that the seven 
children and tlieir classmates and visitors all were readers. Judge Hervey 
Ball lived thirty years m Lake count)-, liuilding up good institutions, and 
died on bis farm October 13. 1868. 

Lewis \\'.\rrixi:u was Ixirn in West Springfield, [Massachusetts, in the 
south parish, now the town of Agawam, in June. 1792. He was a member 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 71 

of an old and well established Massachusetts family, the line running back 
through several generatidus. Coming from the same town as did the Ball 
family and in die same year, he settled on a claim on the southeast side of 
the same beautiful lake, Xovember 9, 1837. 

He had represented his native town four times in the Massachusetts 
Legislature and had filled other positions of honor and trust in his native 
state. 

In that sickly season of 1838 much of the light and joy departed from 
his home in the persons of his wife and young daughter; but the father, 
two sons and a daughter, older than the other yet only a child herself, still 
kept up their frontier home with courage and with hope. In this same year 
a postoffice was established at this home, Lewis Warriner postmaster, the 
second or third one in the county, and this position he held till 1849. I" 
1852 he was re-appointed and held the office till 1856. In 1839 he was 
elected a member of the Indiana Legislature; he took the United States 
census of the county in 1840; and was again elected representative in 1848. 

He was one of the constituent members of the Cedar Lake Baptist 
church in June. 1838, he and his wife having both Ijcen members of the 
Agawam Baptist church in Massachusetts. It was said of him that "as a 
man he always commanded the highest respect and confidence of his neigh- 
bors and acquaintances in all the walks of life, both public and jirivate, and 
was always ready to give his intluence and support for every object tend- 
ing to benefit or improve his fellow-man;" and that "as a Christian he was 
active and sincere, both in his church duties and in his every-day life and 
examples, the influences of which were felt and acknowledged by bis neigh- 
bors and associates." 

He lias no children living, but some grandchildren and great-grand- 
children are yet active in this busy world. He himself died in .Arkansas, 
May 14, i86g, almost seventy-seven years of age. 

He acted at one time as literary critic of that once noted organization, 
the Cedar Lake Belles Lettres Society, of wdiich his daughter and one son 



72 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

were members, to whicli Society Solon Robinson gave one of his charac- 
teristic addresses; and probably no better, no more judicious literary critics 
have since been in the county than were Judge Hervey Ball and Hon. Lewis 
Warriner. Their work in that line, as in many others, will never die. 

Henry Wells was another native of Massachusetts who passed a long 
and active life m Lake county. His name stands among the earliest inhab- 
itants of Crown Point. He held office as Sheriff for many years, and was 
for eight years County Treasurer, and was also Swamp Land Commissioner. 
Four of his sisters also became residents of Crown Point, !\lrs. Russel Eddy, 
Mrs. Olive Eddy, Mrs. Sanford, and Mrs. Gillingham. He lived to be 
quite an aged man and to see many changes. His two sons are Rodman 
H. Wells and Homer Wells, and one daughter is yet living, Mrs. S. Clark. 

William N. Sykes is a name that was prominent in what are known 
sometimes as the squatter records, as early as 1836. He who bore that name 
was a man "of fine appearance, neat in dress and person, gentlemanly in 
bearing, intelligent, and possessing a native refinement of mind." He was 
a descendant of an ancient English family, some of whom had been Quakers 
or Friends since the days of that noted man known as Fox. He was, him- 
self, a native of New Jersey. Circumstances brought him at different times 
to the home of the Ball family at the lake so that he became to them quite 
well known. He was appointed County Surve}'or in May, 1837. He was 
afterward one of the County Commissioners. His active life was cut short 
by death in 1853. He was never married. His burial place is in the Merrill- 
ville Cemetery. There is one monument to his memory, and here is another ; 
that one erected by his kindred, this one written by his once young friend. 

Samuel Turner, of Scotch-L-ish descent, v.-as born in County Tyrone, 
Ireland, in March, 1782. He was married at Gettysburg in 18 10, came to 
LaPorte county in 1833. selected a location on Eagle Creek in 1838, and 
became there a permanent settler of Lake count}- in 1839. Other settlers 
near him at that time were, D. Sarjeant, John Moore, A. D. McCord, George 
Smith, A. Goodrich, Mrs. Mary Dilley. 




DAVID TURNER 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 73 

Samuel Turner was soon elected Justice of the Peace, and about 1842 
Associate judge. The following statement is quoted: "For several years 
there was no cabinet shop nearer than Valparaiso, and having learned the 
use of carpenter tools he was called on to make all the coffins used in the 
neighborhood, frequently taking lumber from the chamber floor of his cabin 
for that purpose, and always without any charge." His residence in the 
county was brief. Kind and obliging, useful, respected, and honored in the 
new community which he was helping to shape, he died in 1847. His wife 
and children remained to carry on the grand work of building up a virtuous 
community. 

David Turner, a son of Judge Samuel Turner, having held several 
public positions in Lake county, may himself well be classed among the pio- 
neers. He was born in Trumbull county, Ohio, in December, 1816; came 
from Pennsyhania with the family to LaPorte county; was one of the 
"young people" who held the Eagle Creek claim in the winter of 1838; and 
was married to Miss Caroline Bissell in 1844. He began early in life to 
hold office. He was elected Justice of the Peace to succeed his father about 
1842. He was elected Probate Judge in 1849, State representative in 1854, 
State Senator in 1858, and was appointed United States Assessor by Presi- 
dent Lincoln in 1862. As would be expected from his Scotch-Irish lineage 
on both his father and his mother's side, he was a man of firm principle, 
a member of the United Presbyterian church, an earnest supporter of Sun- 
day-schools, a friend to all public virtue. His was a very active and useful 
life for many years in the town of Crown Point, and no one has yet come 
forward to make good his vacant place. Two sons are living, and five 
daughters, and several grandchildren. The name Turner is securely writ- 
ten in the county history. 

John W. Dinwiddie was born in Trumbull county, Ohio, October i, 
1813, and the family tradition is, that, on the day of his i>irth, his father 
killed fifteen wild turkey's, four deer, and one bear. As that father was 
Thomas Dinwiddie, a well kmnvn early settler in Porter county, and as it is 



74 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

on a reliable record that one of the Lake county marksmen in 1S82 shot 
fifty-nine wild geese in one day, no one should stop to question that family 
tradition. 

John Wilson Dinwiddie's family line goes l)ack through Thomas Din- 
widdle, his father, and Da\'id Dinwiddie, his grandfather, to David Din- 
w'iddie. his great-grandfather, a Scotch-Irish settler at Marsh Creek, Penn- 
sylvania, about I7-|0. Alembers of fhe old Dinwiddie family of Scotland 
were pioneers in Pennsyb.ania, in Ohio, in LaPorte county, Indiana, in 
Porter, and in Lake. J. W. Dinwiddie li\"ed for some tiiue with his father 
and sister at Indian Town. Ijut afterward made his home at Plum Grove, 
where he obtaineil quite a large tract of land. He spent a few years in 
business life at Crown Point, but as the pioneer days closed and the railroad 
period of new life commenced he made his final home upon his Plum Grove 
farm and commenced farming work there on quite an extensive scale. His 
prairie land ar.d marsh land consisted of about three thousand and fi\'e hun- 
dred acres. He was married August 19, 1844, to Miss M. J. Perkins, of 
Rome, New ^'ork. They had three sons and two daughters. Their home 
was well supplied with material comforts and with books and periodicals, 
and in that home was done a large amou.nt of reading. 

The father held for some time the ofrice of township trustee, and built, 
for that day three large, good frame schoolhouses. It was said of him 
in a memorial record : He "was recognized as one of the most energetic, 
and prudent, and thorough business men and farmers in the county, an 
excellent manager, firm in principle and successful in carrying out his plans, 
and was ra])id!\' advancing in the accumulation of property, when sickness 
came unexpectedly upon him and then death. He died April 12, 1861, being 
forty-seven years of age." 

The descendants of his sons and daughters are many, and his influence 
through them will live long in northwestern Indiana. They are members, 
active and enterjirifing. of two large organizations, the Dinwiddie Clan of 
Lake and Porter counties and the Old Settle;- and Historical .\ssociation 
of Lake countv. 




JOHN W. DINWIDDIE 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 75 

Michael Pearch, of Eagle Creek township, was a quite early settler. 
He located a claim about 1838, before the Land Sale. He was born in Ohio, 
February 20. 1808. He was married in 1840 to Miss Margaret Jane Din- 
widdle. He was a farmer, but held the offices of Justice of the Peace and 
of School Trustee. He died April 4. i86t, of typhoid pneumonia, and his 
death, at that exciting time in the history of the country, made, with that 
of his wife's brother, J. W. Dinwiddle, a great loss to the community. He 
has three sons now li\ing and four daughters. Also many grandchildren. 

The attentive reader mav notice that one cluster of families in the 
county have the name written Pierce; the other, these Eagle Creek families, 
write Pearce. 

Ebexezer Saxton, a nati\e of Vermont, who had resided in Canada 
for some time, in the year of the Patriot \A'ar, 1837, sold his farm in Canada 
on credit, and m a wagon drawn by oxen started with his family for Detroit, 
distant four hundred miles. That journey was safely made. Following 
the westward movement, in that year of very large migration, the Saxton 
family passed onward from Detroit toward Fort Dearborn, or the young 
Chicago, taking no doubt the then well traveled stage road, till they reached 
Deep River at the new town of Liverpool. Here they f(jund a ferry boat, 
and eight families, it is said, went on board with their ox teams. The boat 
sank. The families were at length taken across the ri\-er, the boat was 
raisedi, refitted for service, and the ox teams were ferried over. 

The Saxton family started southward into the new Lake county, their 
means now reduced to five dollars in gold. Reaching Turkey Creek the 
oxen for the first time on that long journey were stuck fast w^th their load 
in the deep mud. Two dollars was the sum of money paid here to some 
man for helping them out. He ought not to have taken anything. [It is 
in the kno^dedge of this writer that the streams of Lake county were full 
of water and mud, or perhaps quick-sand, in the spring and early summer 
of 1837. He h.ad abundant reason to know.] 

The Saxton family, with three dollars remaining, passed on to wdiat 



76 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

was the old McGwinn Indian village and burial ground and dancing floor, 
then known as Wiggins Point, where the}- found the Wiggins cabin and 
sought shelter and rest; and where at length, for many years, they made 
their abode. 

This family brought into the county a sea shell called a conch, which 
according to family tradition came over with Ebenezer Saxton in the May- 
flower, and has been handed down from one generation of Ebenezer Saxtons 
to another till it reached the one who came to Wiggins' Point. He met 
with more than the ordinary trials and disappointments of frontier life, but 
passed through them as became a descendant of a Mayflower family, was 
a prominent citizen of what became the village of IMerrillville, and lived to 
a good old age. He has left at Merrilhille some worthy descendants. 

SiGLER. — :S.\MUEL SiGLER chosc, in 1 837. a location, as some others 
did, on the sandy soil north of the prairie belt. His log cabin remained for 
many years on a "sand hill north of the Sykes" ])lace." He was another of 
the early settlers who had reached middle age. He had four sons, Samuel. 
Eli, Daniel, and William, all of whom l^iecame merchants. He had three 
daughters, one of whom became the wife of Hon. Bartlett ^^"oods. The 
father of these seven children, the living one of whom is aged now, died at 
Hebron about forty years ago. 

WiLLi.'VM SiGLER was a merchant for man}- years at Lowell. He was 
born December 31. 1822, in Clarksburg, which is now in ^^'est ^^irginia, 
and so was fifteen years of age when the Sigler family settled in this county. 
In May, 1848, he was married to Miss Margaret Lee. In 1881 he removed 
from Lake county to Englewood and afterward to La Grange, where he died 
in 1902, nearly eighty years of age. • 

Of the nine members of the Sigler family of 1837 one only is now 
living. Mr. Eh Sigler, of Hebron, for many years one of the principal busi- 
ness men of that town. He has a son in Crown Point. Mr. E. Sigler, jeweler, 
and a daughter, Mrs. \\'. B. Brown: and William Sigler has a son in this 
county, Charles Sigler. the hotel builder at Cedar Lake. Samuel Sigler, the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 77 

pioneer, has ir. the county other grandchildren. His descendants are to be 
found in other family lines. 

Belshaw. — George Bel.sh.\\v came from England, with quite a large 
family, in 1834. The family located for a short time on Rolling Prairie 
in LaPorte county, where the older daughter. ?klary, was married. The 
family soon came to the south, part of Lake Prairie, that lieauty of the In- 
diana prairie belt, and there settled on farms in this cnunty of Lake. The 
sons were George. William, Henry. Charles, and Samuel. The daughter 
wdio came to Lake Prairie was named Ann. She died in 1846 when eighteen 
years of age. Her memorial is in the "Lake of the Red Cedars. '" 

This family, with the exception of two sons, remoyed to Oregon in 
1853. where George Belshaw, who had married the younger daughter of 
Judge McCarty, became a large and noted wheat-raiser. 

William Belshaw, who remained in this county, had yisited England 
in 1846 to see once more his birthplace, and in 1847 '"'''^'^^ ^^^^" '"'ii'i'ied to 
T\Iiss Harriet A. Jones, continuing to liye on his Lake Prairie farm, died 
there in Xoyember, 1884, seyenty-one years of age. Of his three sons. one. 
Edward Belshaw, now liyes at Lowell. His daughters are, in number, also 
three, all married and well settled in life. 

Hexry Belshaw. the <ither son remaining in this county, married Miss 
Mary Smith. He resided for many years on his pine groye farm and then 
remo\ed to Lowell, where he died a few years ago. He had two sons and 
fiye daughters. One daughter is Mrs. Simeon Sanger, of Lowell, and the 
youngest, Candace, was married. October 22, 1884, to E. W. Dinwiddle, of 
Plum Groye. 

J. D. Jones came to this county in 1847. He was born in Massachu- 
setts, January c), 1808, was married, January 7, 1829, to Miss Polly Calkins, 
\yho was born June g, 1809. This wife died .\pril 10, 1856. One of her 
daughters. Aliss Ann C. Jones, was married in 1846 to John Wheeler, after- 
ward Colonel '\\'heeler, who fell in 1)attle on the bloody but decisi\-e battle- 
field of Gettysburg. Another of her daughters was Mrs. Burr Judson. now 



78 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

li\iiig- in Crown Point. And the third was married to William Clark, grand- 
sor. of the pioneer Judge A\"illiam Clark. 

April 4. 1857, one year after the death of his first wife. J- D. Jones, 
then thirty-nine years of age, was married to a widow woman, Mrs, Nelson, 
who had two young sons, one of whom became the well known banker, now 
living at Lowell, Frank Nelson. He is therefore a step-brother of Mrs, 
Judson, of Crown Point. The father and step-father of these two well 
known citizens was a West Creek farmer, living many years on his farm in 
the Belshaw or Pine Grove neighborhood and died April 2;^. 1893, eighty- 
five years of age, for about forty-six years a citizen of Lake county, 

Merrill and ]\Ierrillville. — In 1837, when according to the Claim 
Register eighty-one men became settlers in the newly organized county, 
Dudley Merrill bought a claim which had been made by Amsi L, Ball 
or by his son, John Ball, settlers of 1836, located on Deep River south of 
"Miller's Mill." But be soon obtaineil land at \\'iggins" Point and made 
there a permanent home. A\'illiam Merrill, his brother, came with him 
in 1837 as a settler. He also obtained land at Wiggins" Point, and at length 
erected a cjuite large frame dwelling house on the north side of the old 
Indian trail, opposite the Indian dancing floor where the Saxton family had 
located, that trail becoming the mail route to Joliet from LaPorte and a 
great thoroughfare for western tra\el. 

Soon village life commenced. A bcjtel was opened and a store, and 
then a blacksmith shop, and the name of Wiggins" Point was changed to 
Centerville. A postoifice was needed before long, and the name was changed 
to Merrillville, Both the brothers had sons, and around the Saxton and 
Merrill families quite a community grew up. Dudley INIerrill started into 
operation a cheese factory, having also foi a time the hotel, and carrying 
on a farm. C^nly one of bis sons, Charles L. ^lerrill, is now living; Dr. 
Wallace Merrill is a son of William Merrill; and one of his daughters be- 
came a good teacher. There were two other brothers of this Pennsylvania 
Merrill family who settled in this county. John Merrill and Lewis Mer- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 79 

RILL, both of tliese being for some time citizens of Crown Point. Two sis- 
ters also became residents of the conntv : and of the descendants of William 
and Dudley and John and Lewis jMerrill, and of the sisters, there are many 
to represent still their Pennsylvania ancestors, though not all bearing the 
Meri'ill name. 

J.\coB HcRLBURT was a young man in Porter county in 1834. He was 
with the Cnited States surveyors, as an assistant in some capacity, in the 
summer of that year, while they cam])ed where afterward Crown Point grew 
up; and in October of that year he guided Solon Robinson with his piwiv 
U< that same locality. He at length settled in the eastern part of Lake ci unity 
antl gave name to what has long been known as Hurlburt Corners. He was 
a good citizen. He li\-ed to be quite an aged man and died in Februar}-. 
i88t. 

CvRus M. Mason was born in Otisco, Onondaga county, New York, 
January 27. 181 1. He was the son of Josiah ALison. When he was ten 
years of age the family remo\ed to Berry township and there remained for 
some years. In the sp>ring of 1832. then twenty-one years of age. he went 
with his father s famih- into Michigan Territorv. a member of a true pioneer 
family in that newly settled region, a large tract of land in Indiana and 
Michigan ha\ing that year been purchased from the Pottawottamie Indians. 
He remained some time with his father in ^Michigan and learned the art of 
brickmaking. In 1838. about December, he went into LaPorte county, 
Indiana, and culti\-ate(l a farm there in the summer of 1839. In 1840 he 
came into Lake county and settled on a farm a mile east of Crown Point, 
where he lived throagh the remainder of a long. acti\-e, useful life. 

In 1841 he commenced making brick according to the slow and lalxiri- 
ous process of those days, and made one million before he discontinued the 
business. He was a constituent member of the Crown Point Presbvterian 
church, one of its first Elders, and from his official position was widely known 
as Deacon Mason. He lived to be eighty-six and a half years of age, a 
highlv valued and valuable member of the church and of the communitv. 



80 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

• His father died in [Michigan about 1850, seventy-five years of age, and his 
mother, born in 1777, died in 1871, wanting only six years of filHng out a 
century. 

Before Deacon ]\Iason's death, feehng that he would soon pass away, 
he requested tlie writer of tin's memorial to take down from his dving lips, 
while his mental faculties were still good, the foregoing outline of a long 
life. Surely no one more riclily than he deserves the name of a zcorthy pio- 
neer. Such men lay good foundations as builders of states or counties or 
neighborhoods : and many such helped to make Lake county as virtuous as 
still it is. Let their names be honored. 

John Underwood was one of three brothers, Harmon Underwood and 
Daniel Underwood, the other two, who had farms, one, two, and three miles 
east from IMerrilhille. His sisters now living are Mrs. Harper, ]\Irs. Joy, 
and Mrs. Palmer. He carried on a farm for many years. He was County 
Commissioner in 1858, and a debt of gratitude is due to him for preventing 
by his tact a proposed loss of territory from the county. 

Unknown, perhaps, to many of his neighbors, he was decidedly a poet. 
This writer calls him the poet of Lake county, and he knows of nothing 
written in Indiana, of the same style of poetic composition, to excel "El 
Muza" and "Lindenwald" written b}- the plain farmer. John L^nderwood. 
His style of writing is very different from that of James W'hitcomb Riley. 
It is not humorous. It is not pathetic. It may not be called popular. But 
it shows much historic reading and a \-ivid fancy, good descriptive jMwers 
and a love for beauty in scenery and nobleness and greatness in human 
action. 

"El ]\Iuza" is a Spanish tale of love and war in nine cantos, pages 148, 
and one who can read with interest Sir Walter Scott's "Vision of Don 
Roderick," ought to read with interest "El Muza." 

"Lindenv.ald" is a larger work, pages 165, also nine cantos, and deals 

also with war and human love. It is historic. Is called a "Tale of the 

"Siege of Vienna." The author says in his preface, "The year 1683 will ever 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 81 

be memorable in Austrian history as the last invasion by the Turks and the 
siege of Vienna.'" That the author liail read European history to some pur- 
pose is evident, and a cultivated mind, interested in historic poetry in which 
facts are interwoven with poetic fiction, will find interest in this. Lake 
county has no writer who can equal these poems now. 

PR.MRIE WEST PIONEERS. 

Among a few very early residents who were considerablv advanced in 
life was one of the settlers on Prairie West in 1836, Rich.\rd Church. 
Some of his children, even then, had families of their own. He had lived 
in Michigan Territory for a time, but before that became a state he made 
his last home in Lake county. Indiana. He was one of the pioneer Baptists 
of the county, taking an active part in the organization of the first Baptist 
church. He had a large family of sons and daughters, nearly all of whom 
were men and women in 1837. His home, the home of his son. Darling 
Church, those of his son-in-law, Leonard Cutler, of his near neighbor, W. 
Rockwell, of Mrs. Owen, a widow woman from Wales, of Mrs. Leland 
with several sons, of John Bothwell. were the early homes of what was 
called for a few years Prairie West, all of which prairie is now thickly cov- 
ered over with the homes of the German settlers who have spread out from 
the Hack and Schmal center at St. John. 

The work of that very worthy citizen, Richard Church, was done more 
through his children than by himself, as only a few years of active life were 
assigned to him here. 

Another of the early settlers well advanced also in life, was William 
Rockwell, a near neighbor to the Church families of Prairie West, one of 
whose .sons, W . B. Rockwell, was born in 1813 or 1814. and the other, 
T. C. Rockwell, in 1817. The Rockwell family orignally came from Con- 
necticut, residing for a time in Xcw York state, where these sons were born. 
The Church family came from X'ew York, stopping for a time in Michigan. 
A son of the Church family. Darling, the father of Edwin Church, had mar- 
ried a daughter of the Rockwell family. There were other daughters of the 



82 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Rockwell family. The father. William Rockwell, was for some time Couiitv 
Commissioner. Tlie date of his election is gi\-en as 1840. His date of set- 
tlement i? 1837. He died in 1855. when ahont seventy-four years of age. 
He must therefore have been about fifty-six in 1837. 

Both the sons left the farm and became citizens of Crown Point, ^^'ill- 
iam B. Rockwell, commonly called liy his familiar friends Commodore, was 
twice married. Bcjth his wi\-es died, one in 18G6. the second in 1876, and 
left no children. He still kept up his interest in life and in the town. He 
was for some time a town Trustee. Many years ago he bought for two 
bundled dollars forty acres of land which contained a cranberrv marsh. 
The yield that year proved to be large, the price was high, and he cleared 
on the one crop fifteen hundred dollars. His own time tO' die came in 1896. 

T. C. Rockwell, the other son, was married in 1845 to ^tliss JNIalinda 
Brown. He bought hotel property in Crown Point which was well known 
for many years as tiie Rockwell House. He retired at length to private life, 
occupying a neat residence on Court street. Two daughters, Airs. \\'ard 
and Mrs. Raasch, reside in Crown Point, and three sons have Ijeen in busi- 
ness life for many years. These all ha\'e families, but not so large as was 
their grandfather's family who had the honor of being one of the last asso- 
ciate judges of Lake county, elected a little time before the oflice was abol- 






ished in 183 1. 

[Note. — The name Commodore, so generally given to ^\■illiam B. Rock- 
well, is said to have been applied to him from Commodore Perry, who in 
September, 1813, achieved so great a \-ictory on Lake Erie: and as William 
B. was born in September, it seems much more natural that the title of Com- 
modore should have been applied to tbie babe then born, than to one born 
a whole year after that noted victory.] 

Ch.\rles L. Templeton was born December 2, 1816, and became a 

resident of this county in 1840, and died Jnnuary is, 1899. eighty-two years 

of aoe. He was an active and useful citizen in dift'erent lines of effort, as a 

farmer and promoting the Grange movement and interests, as a friend of 

Sundav-schools, encouraging the early celebrations, and aiding through 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 83 

almost sixty active years tilings that were good. His wife was a daughter 
of W. Rockwell, of Prairie West, and sister of \\'. B. Rockwell and T. C. 
Rockwell, of Cro\\"n Point. 

A. X. Hart, the large land owner and business man of Dver, came to 
Lake county from Philadelphia about 1835. He had been interested in book 
publishing. A large work in four richl_\ bound volumes is in the possession 
of this writer. It is called "The National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished 
Americans, with Biographical Sketches." Publishers. D. Rice & A. X. 
Hart. 1854. It is a grand work, massi\-ely bound, richlv gikled, v.-ith man)- 
portraits, and although it is fifty years since these volumes passed from the 
hands of the binder they look as though just issued from the press. \\'ith 
all the modern improvements of the last fifty years, no better portraits or 
more substantially bound books can easily be found now. That the man who 
was engaged in publishing such books should come with his family to the 
sand ridge of Dyer, and should accjuire possession of so- much of the wet 
land eastward included in the original Lake George, is one more of the facts 
that show how fortunate Lake county was in having among her settlers such 
capable men as those that came from New England, Xew York, Ohio, and 
Pennsylvania. 

GERMAN PIONEERS. 

There began to come, in the early period of the settlement of this county, 
immigrants from the old kingdom of Prussia, from Hanover, from Wiir- 
temberg, and different principalities now united in the great German Em- 
pire, to find homes on these then open prairies and to make farms in the 
then untenanted woodlands. 

Since that early period tb.ere have followed them families from Sweden 
and Xorway, from Holland and Poland, from Bohemia and Italv, and other 
European countries, making a mixture of languages and nationalities resem- 
bling the great mixture in the city of Chicago. Some memorials of German 
settlers will follow here. 

John Hack was born in 1787, in a Rhine province that passed from. 



84 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

France to Prussia, and came into this county with a quite large family in 
1837. He was the first German settler so far as known. He established 
a home on the western limit of what was called Prairie West. 

Receiving- the hospitalities of that family one August night in 1838, the 
v.-riter of this memorial made the following record: "In the summer even- 
ings the family would gather around an out-of-doors fire, the smoke of 
which would keep off the mosquitoes, and sing the songs of their native 
Rhine region, presenting a scene at once picturesque and impressive." Their 
two guests, while ignorant of the language, could enjoy the music of those 
beautiful evening songs of the "father-land." Those early Germans did 
much singing in the evening and when out from home in the still night 
hours. The night music is no longer heard. Another record of John Hack 
is this: "Tall and dignified in person, patriarchal in manner, clear and keen 
in intellect, he was well fitted to be a leader and a pioneer." He had large 
views of government and looked closely into the genius of our institutions." 

In 1838 the four families of Joseph Schmal, Peter Orte, Michael Adler, 
Matthias Reder, came from Germany together and settled near the Hack 
family, and others soon followed. In 1843 on the Hack land was erected 
and consecrated a Roman Catholic chapel and regular religious services were 
held. The founder of the settlement, near whose early home spot is now the 
town St. John, lived to see great changes in the land of his adoption. Greater 
ones, of which he never thought, his descendants in Crown Point now behold. 
Times Change. 

Joseph .Schmal, one of the four who crossed the ocean in 1838, had 
quite a family of sons and tlaughters. He was not a young man and did 
not become very fully americanized ; but one of his sons, Ad.^m Schmai., 
became prominent in political life, and held for two terms the office of county 
Treasurer. Another son, bearing his father's name, Joseph Schm.-\l, 
became a prdminent farmer at Brunswick. One daughter, marrying a son 
of tlie Hack family, Mrs. .Angelina Hack, was for many years an active, 
energetic, well known, and much respected woman in the life of Crown 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 85 

Point. One of her sons. John Hack, two miles east of Crown Point, is 
one of the noted (lair)'men of Lake c<nint}'. George Schmah another grand- 
son of the pioneer of 1838, is a town officer of Crown Point. The descend- 
ant? of good immigrants become in two generations, some e\'en in one, good 
Americans. The descendants of some foreigners never become good citizens. 

Henry S.^sse, Sr.. the pioneer of the Lutheran Ciermans, came fmm 
Michigan in 1838, with a small family, and iMTnight the Cox claim and Chase 
claim on the northwest of the Red Cedar Lake. He was a man of much 
nati^■e abilit_\', he had much, intelligence, and had gained quite a knowledge 
of our language and of American ways after leaving his native Hano\er. 
He came with means and accumulated property in this country. Circum- 
stances led him to \'isit three times his native land, sO' that at least seven times 
lie crossed the Atlantic, Death was quite a frequent visitor in his home, 
and few remain to represent his early Hanover township family circle. .\ 
granddaughter, Mrs. Groman, resides in Crown Point, and she has one son' 
and one daughter and one granddaughter. A son, also living, Herman E. 
Sasse. is now one of the prominent business men of Crown Point. L'nlike 
the name of Hack, there is little promise for the Sasse name to go into 
future generations. But the results of the life here for so manv yars of 
Henry Sasse, Sr.. and the results of the much shorter life of his oldest son, 
Henry Sasse, Junior, will go on into future years. 

Henry Von Hollen w^as another of those very intelligent, energetic 
Lutheran Gerr^ians who came to the lake neighborhood in 1838. He had 
received in his Em"opean home quite a drill in the line of cavalry soldiers 
and in the care of their equipments. He was a quite tall, strong man, one to 
make at least a shovv-y soldier. 

LTnlike his neighbor, H. Sasse, he came with very little means with 
which to open and improve a farm, but he soon, purchased some wild land 
on which liiere h.ad been found a large cranberry marsh, and this investment 
made him in a few years comparatively rich, so that when he died he left 
his wife in possession of ample means, and at her death she was al)le to rank 



86 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

ns one of tlie wealtliy women of Lake connty. She lived for sixty-five vears 
where they two as young liousekeepers settled in 1838, and of that small 
household there is no descendant left. But circumstances will cause the name 
Von Hollcn, or Van Hollen, as more generally called, for some time yet in 
Hanover township to continue to live. 

Lewis Herlitz was the third of that little band of Protestant Germans 
of 1838. He was a native of P}'rmont, a part of the principality of W'al- 
deck. He bought what was known as the Nordyke claim north of the lake, 
his wife and ]\Irs. H. Sasse were sisters. He built a new residence on that 
early claim, secured a good title from the Government for the land, and a 
pleasant family home in a few years was his. Three sons and some daughters 
grew up in that home, a home noted for intelligence and politeness, and in 
1869 the father died. In the home and at Crown Point the children and 
grandchildren yet live. 

Another of the well known early German settlers was Herman 
DoESCHERj who came into the west part of Hanover township in 1842, with 
one son and some more than ordinarily fine-looking and polite young daugh- 
ters. He died in December, 1886, having lived in the county forty-four 
years, himself eighty-four years of age, and leaving six children, thirty- 
seven grandchildren, and twenty-one great-grandchildren. 

J- C. Sauerman. Coming from Bavaria in 1846. then fourteen years 
old, J. C. Sauerman had a home in Chicago for three years, he visited liis 
old home in Europe, returned to this country, and, in 1S51. became a resi- 
dent of Crown Point. In 1853, then alxiut twenty-one years of age, he was 
married to Miss Strochlein, a daughter of John Strochlein, who became a 
resident in the county in 1852. He opened a harness store and factorv in 
Crown Point, employed workmen in the harness-making business, and was 
successful as a salesman and manufacturer. Success resulted in the accu- 
nnilation of property. z\bout 1875 he sold his harness business, was elected 
count}- Treasurer, and at length retired from business and public life. In 
person he was of about medium height, rather slender in form, quick, active 



SS.' 



■^^ f^. 



^>t 



i 




JOHN KROST 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 87 

in !iis iiio\-emenls. In social i|ualitics Ik- was kindly, gentlemanly, gen- 
erously disposed, urbane. He was a menil)er of the Lutheran church, a 
useful, worthy citizen, a noble Christian man. 

His two children are residents of Crown Point, A. A. Sauerman, Cash- 
ier of the First National Bank of Crown Foint, and Mrs. Henry Pettibone. 
His grandchildren are in number four, among them one voung man to bear 
and perhaps transmit the Sauerman name and virtues. 

John Krost. One more of many citizens of favored Lake county wdio 
by means of talent and intelligent effort became prominent was Ji.ihn Krost. 
Born in Germany in 1828, he became a resident in Hobart in 1853, where 
for one year he was clerk in a store : then for about six years a clerk at j\Ier- 
rillville, and a farmer for two years; and then lie made his final home in 
Crown Point. 

He was elected county Treasurer in 1862 and continued in office till 
1867. In 1868 he was elected county Auditor and held that office for eight 
years. He was accommodating and very coiu'teous, he was kind and gen- 
erous to the poor, the needy, and the unfortunate or the unsuccessful. He 
was an exemplary member of the Roman Catholic church. He accumulated 
quite an amount of property, and his home on Main street was one of com- 
forts, of social advantages, of cultivation and refinement. 

His children have been educated. He died in Alarch, 1890. not only 
one of the wealthy, but one of the most kindly and gentlemanly of Crown 
Point's many cultured citizens. 

One of his sons is a physician in Cliicago, and one a medical student at 
Rush. One is a dentist in Crown Point, gentlemanly and kindly as was his 
father. One has been county Recorder, and one is in Germany, learning 
the ways of his father's nati\-e land. Three daughters are living, educated 
and cultivated, and the sixth son is a student at Notre Dame, South Bend. 

The names of several early citizens of Crown Point are placed in this 
group wiili only short notices or brief records, as of some their residence 
here was brief, and of others not much is now fuUv known. 



88 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

MiLO Robinson, a brother of the founder of Crown Point, joined his 
brother here in November, 1835. He came from New York city, was with 
his brother in the first store, he kept the first hotel, was a Justice of the 
Peace, and, as did his brother Solon, solemnized marriage, but died in 1839. 

H. S. Pelton, an early resident, came into possession of the Robinson 
store about 1840. An active business man in Crown Point for a few years, 
he died May 26, 1847, sri<^ his goods passed into the ownership of Carter 
& Carter of New York, and soon after into the possession of J. W. Din- 
widdle, who for a time was a merchant in Crown Point. 

Joseph P. Smith came from New York and "settled July 5," 1836, 
in Crown Point. For several years he was a leading business man, and 
also the principal military man. He led a company of men to the Mexican 
war and returned with some of them. He was the second county Clerk 
holding office from 1843 to 1847. After some years he went into the then 
wild and yet new West, and was shot at and was killed by those noiseless 
but often deadly weapons, Indian arrows. Captain once of the Monroe 
Blues in the city of New York, a man quite fond of military life, it seemed 
strange that he should fall while at work in his field by the hand of an 
unseen American Indian. 

Judge Clark. \\'illiam Clark was born about 1788, probably in New 
York or Nevv England, in what was called "the East,"" and became a quite 
early settler in Jennings county, Indiana. His wife \\as Miss Ann Campbell, 
for whom in.quiry was niatle at Crown Point a few years ago in order to 
fill up a genealogical record. In February, 1835, the Clark family came 
with ox teams from Jennings county to Lake county. They came with three 
sons, Thomas, Alexander, and John F., and two daughters. Margaret, who 
was married to an early settler at Crown Point, W. R. \\'illiams (a descend- 
ant according to family tradition, of Roger Williams, founder of Rhode 
Island), and Man- M., who was married to Benjamin Kellogg. 

Judge Clark was active and prominent, along with Solon Robinson, 
as one of the proprietors of Crown Point, where his log cabin remained for 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. S9 

some years near the present East and South streets. He afterward hved 
two miles east on a farm. He died in 1869. He had a stout, vigorous frame, 
but was not tall in person. 

Thomas Clark, his oldest son, was married by Judge H. D. Palmer, 
January 23, 1839, to Miss Harriet Lavina Farwell, whose home was on the 
west side of West Creek, south of the present village of Brunswick. The 
marriage party, some on foot and some on horseback, which passed up the 
next day to Lake Court House, was, for those days, quite an event. The 
writer of this is probably the only living witness. They were active members 
of society in their day, keeping for a time the hotel known as tlie Mills and 
then as the Rockwell house, and for a time living on the farm two miles east 
where Mrs. Farwell. Mrs. Clark's mother, died, and a burial procession passed 
over that same road back to the cemetery south of Brunswick. Both Mr. and 
Mrs. Clark closed up life many years ago. Some of their descendants yet live 
in Crown Point. 

Alexander Clark. Judge Clark's second son. born in Jennings county, 
November 4. 1822. was married to A'liss Susan Wells (a pioneer child of De- 
cember, 1835). November 5. 1848. He became an enterprising and prosper- 
ous farmer, living two miles east of Crown Point, where he died in 1879. 
Mrs. Susan Clark and her daughter, now Mrs. John ^L Hack, still reside on 
the farm, near a cluster of grand oak trees which must ha\-e seen more than 
one generation of Indians pass away before the white settlers came. 

HoLTON. Associated with the Clark and Robinson families in Jennings 
county, and associated with them here in starting a settlement and a village 
and at length a town, were the members of the Holton family of 1835. The 
two sons were, J. W. Holton, commonly called Warner Holton. and W. A. 
W. Holton, usually called \\'illiam Holton. 

The following is their line of descent from their English ancestor: i. 
William Holton came from England in the ship Francis in 1634. He died in 
1691. 2. John Holton, his son. died in 1712. 3. William Holton of the 
third generation died in 1757. 4. John Holton of the next generation died 



90 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

in 1797. 5. Joel Holton was born in 1738. 6. Alexander Holton, the 
lawyer, the father of \\'arner and A\"illiam. was born in 1779. 7. J. W. Hol- 
ton (\\'arner) was born in 1807. The two brothers became, with their 
mother, of whom in another chapter a record will be found, and with their 
sister, members of the little hamlet formed in the center of Lake countv in 
1835. They were connected with learned and cultivated men of the Holton 
line, and, of their mother's seven sisters, — that mother was Harriet Warner 
of Xev>- England — one was ^Irs. Robinson, wife of the wealthy governor of 
Vermont, one was Mrs. Stuart, wife of the wealthy Judge Stuart of Vermont, 
one was Mrs. Bradley, wife of a Vermont lawyer, one was ]vlrs. Brown, wife 
of a Massachusetts lawyer, and yet another, ]Mrs. Hitchcock, was also wife of 
a Massachusetts lawyer. With such family connections and in such a line, the 
Holtons would be expected to be intelligent, if they were early Indiana 
pioneers, and intelligent they all were. 

W. A. W. Holton was the first Recorder of Lake county. He was also 
School Examiner and could examine a candidate for a teacher's license in 
fifteen minutes, finding out very readily whether one was intelligent or ig- 
norant. Prominent and useful citizens of the county in its earlier years, 
Warner Holton at length removed to Arkansas and there died, and ^V. A. W. 
Holton closed his quite long life in Oakland. California. His father and 
mother both born and speiiding their early years not far from "the Bay 
where the Mayflower lay." and into which the ship Francis sailed, he spent 
his last years where the great Pacific dashes its waves upon our golden \\'est. 

Jonathan Warner Holton (J. \\'. ) vras the first white owner of the land 
wdiere is now the Crown Point public school building, making his claim on 
the southeast quarter of Section 5, Thirty years after his settlement, in 1835. 
wdien the ground was secured for the Crown Point Institute, in 1865, the old 
orchard was standing. 

Richard F.\ncher, an explorer here in 1834. a settler in 1835. lived for 
a short time on the bank near the little lake where he first made his claim, but 
finding an Indian float on all of Section 17, he was soon counted in with the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 91 

families of the village. He was boni in iSoo. He hadfive daughters, and 
these became Mrs. J. C. Xiclmlson, ]\Irs. Alton, Mrs. Sanford Clark, ]Mrs. J. 
Clingan. and I\Irs. Harry Church. Excepting himself the family were Pres- 
byterians. He lived to a good old age and died at the home of his daughter, 
^Irs. Clingan. in 1893. 

Russell Eddy, born in Pittstown, New York, in April, 1787, son of 
General Gilbert Eddy who commanded some of the New York troops in the 
war of 18 12. himself at the same time a paymaster in the army, afterward a 
merchant in the city of Troy, married to Miss Ruth Ann Wells, of Massa- 
chusetts, coming to Michigan City in 1836, became a resident of Lake Court 
House in 1837. His was one of the first if not the ven.^ first frame dwelling 
house, and it is probable that in his home was the first piano in the county, one 
b.eing there in 1838. He was for many years an influential citizen, the family 
having, for those years, abundant means, his wife a leader in the Presbyterian 
church and her home a resting place for ministers, a home for some time for 
the first resident Presbyterian pastor. Rev. W. Townley; and in that home a 
young, beautiful, and refined daughter, Ruth Ann. She married young and 
died young, leaving no children. And neither in Lake county, nor yet out of 
Lake county, are there any bearing the name of Eddy to claim descent 
through Russell Eddy from General Gilbert Eddy of New York, and hold the 
position in society that once was theirs. Some families have a large increase 
in members and in wealtl; in two or three generations; some fail to keep up 
their ancestral position : some lose the ancestral name. 

Fowler. Anotlier true j^ioneer. and in fact one of the earliest dwellers 
in th.e hamlet that grew into the county seat was Luman A. Fowler. He 
was born in Eerkslnrt county, ^Massachusetts, October i, 1809. He came 
with Henry Wells in the fall of 1834 and spent one night with some explorers 
on the wooded bank of the Lake of Red Cedars. He returned to the camp of 
Solon Robinson and with his small company, six in all, himself making seven, 
he spent the winter. There were t\^■o other families before the winter closed, 
twenty-one persons in all, that made up the hamlet. In 1835 Luman A, Eow- 



92 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

!er went to Michigan, then a territory, and in October was married to i\Iiss 
Ehza Cochran, born in New York October 2-j, 1816. In December they came 
to the hamlet wliere he had spent the last winter. Travelling in those days 
was more expensive than it is now, for the Fowler record of expenses for the 
first year has this item at the head of the list: ".\mount of money paid out 
from the time of starting to the landing on Robinson's Prairie is $83.00." 
Their first child was born in October, 1836, Harriet Ann, and eight other 
children, four sons and four daughters, followed her into the household. 
These eight all married and their descendants are many, some in Lake county, 
some are out of the county. 

Luman A. Fowler became fully a public man. He was elected Sheriff of 
Lake county in 1837, in 1847, 1849- i" 1^59' ^^^i, thus holding the office for 
ten years. One of his sons, born in Crown Point and still residing in Crown 
Point, has held the office of town or city marshal. 

A Manufacturer. 

M.\.TOR C. F.\RWELL, a son of James Farwell, an early settler 
on the west side of West Creek, while not among the earliest was quite 
an early settler and resident of Crown Point. He had learned to work iron 
and soon left his father's home, went into School Grove, put up a blacksmith's 
shop and made plows. In 1841 he moved into Crown Point, then the new 
county seat, and in 1842 built a hewed log shop, stocked plows, and began to 
make wagons. He also made a few buggies and some cutters. About 1851 
he sold his establishment and went "westward" on the direction which it is 
said "the star of empire takes." Somewhere on the other side of the ]\Iissis- 
sippi, it is probable his dust is sleeping. He spent some five years in Colorado 
and Idaho and Montana, and afterward resided in Carthage, Missouri. He 
may be called Crown Point's first plow, wagon, and bugg)- maker, 

Bartlett \\'oods. No history of Lake county could lie complete, no 
memorial records of the founders and builders of Lake county would be suf- 
ficiently full, without some mention of one known in later years as Hon. 
Bartlett Woods. Born Julv is. 1818, in Winchelsea, England, jjrougiit up in 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 93 

tliat noted cinque-town called Hastings, where his father was postmaster for 
some forty years, in 1837 he crossed the ocean with a brother. Charles Woods, 
and came to this newly organized county, being then nineteen years of age. 
He little knew then what was liefore him. but e\-ents proved that until Alay. 
1903. his life was to be closely interwoven with the growth and the interests 
of th.e county of Lake. He became a farmer. He was married to jMiss Ann 
Eliza Sigler, who was born in 1827. and who died October 6, 1900. He re- 
sided for many years on his farm between Merrillville and Ross, and at length 
retired with his wife and youngest daughter to Crown Point. 

He had received in England an education such as became a postmaster's 
son, but had not taken a Rugl-y or an Oxford course of study. He was 
through his life here a reader and a thinker, and became a public speaker and 
a writer. His public, political life commenced in the fall of 1848, when he 
was thirty years of age. The event was "the first free soil meeting in Lake 
county." The following influential and then active citizens are named as 
having l^een present: "Judge Clark, Alexander AIcDonald, Wellington Clark, 
Alfred Foster, Dr. Pettibone. Luman A. Fowler, William Pettibone, John 
Wood, of Deep River, Bartlett Woods, Jonas Rhodes, Samuel Sigler, David 
K. Pettibone. and Dr. Wood of Lowell." Besides these who are named there 
was an audience filling the room of the Log Court House. Judge Clark was 
chosen to preside and W. A. Clark and Bartlett Woods were Secretaries. 
After this quite enthusiastic meeting held September 16. 1848. ]\Ir. Woods 
made arrangements to go out wdth Alexander McDonald, the lawyer of Crown 
Point, and deliver free-soil speeches. Lito this campaign he entered heartilv, 
and he wrote in 1884, "From this time on. Lake county's free-soil idea grew 
in strength. It was the germ from which the Republican Party sprung." 
(Lake county had been strongly Democratic rather than \Miig). He adds: 
"Its large Republican vote attests this. Its vote for Fremont, for Lincoln, and 
for Grant and Colfax, and for Colfax all through his congressional course, 
gained for it the honor of being one of the banner Republican counties of the 
.State." In 1861 and in 1865 he was elected State Representative. 



yi HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Besides his interest in political affairs, he took a large interest as a farmer 
in the Grange movement and in farmers' institutes. As a pioneer whose date 
of residence here went back to the year of the organization of the countv he 
was thoroughly interested in tlie Association of the early settlers, and was an 
officer for man}- years of that organization. And as a friend of what he re- 
garded as right, the older supporters of law and order passing one by one 
away, he came more and more to the front, in conflicts of opinion or of inter- 
est, ready to confront what he thought was wrong and to advocate what he 
believed was right, until he became for Lake county what John Ouincy 
Adams became for Massachusetts, "the Old Man Eloquent." And not only 
with his voice but with his pen. which he freely used, he set forth the views 
which he held and advocated until he was about eighty-four years of age. 
He has four sons living and three daughters, and a number of grandchildren. 

J.\MES H. Luther, ^^'hile not at first a resilient within the area that 
liecame Lake county, James H. Luther passed "back and forth" along the 
Lake Michigan beach as early as 1835 and 1834. his father's home then Ix-ing 
in Porter or La Porte county, himself being nineteen years of age when he 
made his first trip around the south border of the great lake. He came into 
Lake county in 1840 and became a resident or a visitor long enough, to be- 
come deeply interested in a Lake county girl, ^liss P. .\. Flint, a member of 
that large IMethodist Flint family, yet to he mentioned, of South East Grove, 
whom he married, two ^Methodi^^t ministers selecting wives also from that 
large cluster of attractive girls. He went back with his ynung wife to Porter 
county l)ut became a resident of Crown Point in 1840. That young wife soon 
passed away from him and went o\er the unseen river. leaving him with 
some young l)ovs that needed care and training. About 1852 he married a 
widow, Mrs. M. ]\I. Mills, and until 1854 kept the hotel then known as the 
Mills and afterwards as the Rockwell house. The second wife proved to be 
a good mother for his own and for other motherless children. 

In i860 he was elected county Auditor aufl held the office for eight 
years. His material interests prospered year by year and he at length became 




JAMES H. LUTHER 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 95 

one of the capitalists of Crown Point. He was a g-enerous. kind-hearted man. 
of refined feehngs and sympathies, a man also of good judgment, a man to 
make an excellent member of any organization, and one to he selected as a 
good neighbor and friend. For some reason or for no reason that could be 
named, from the tirst time that they met as strangers to each other in 1853, 
when he did a large kiiiflness. until the \ery last year of his life in 1803, '^^ 
seemed to take, amid all the changes of forty years, a large and peculiar in- 
terest in the welfare of the writer of this memorial record. And this friend- 
ship as marked bv deeds was the more singular on account of the great differ- 
ence between the two in their religious beliefs. 

An earnest, active member of the Old Settler and Historical A.ssocia- 
tion, for some years its Treasurer, James Henry Luther was in his eightieth 
year when he passed to the unseen world. He has one son yet living. John 
E. Luther, and a sister, ]\Irs. Allman, both ha^■ing• homes in Crown Point. 

Another citizen of the county, who like 'Mr. James H. Luther, passed 
around the south shore of Lake ^lichigan in early days, was James Adams, 
of Rose township. His name is gi\-en to a schoolhouse east of Alerrillville 
toward Holjart. He was a stage driver on the line from Detroit to Fort 
Dearborn, on the road opened in 1833. He was liorn in ^Nlanlius, Xew "S'ork, 
September 11, 1814. In 1837 he was sent from Detroit to Fort Dearborn, 
now Chicago, in the month of January, by Governor Mason and General 
Brady, as a messenger to have the soldiers from the fort sent to Detroit. It 
was the time of the Patriots' \\'ar in Canada. The sleighing was then good. 
Warmly clad, furnished by General Brady with good fur gloves, carrying in- 
structions to ha\-e the best horse furnished for him at each stage house, he 
was to make the distance, 284 miles, in twenty-four hours if possible. The 
stopping places where he could change horses were from twelve to fourteen 
miles apart. He ga\'e the attending hostlers onlv a few moments to change 
horses, requiring each time the best horse in the stable, and he reached Chicago 
or the fort in twenty-eight hours, leaving Detroit at 4 o'clock in the afternoon 
and reaching the fort at 8 o'clock on the next afternoon. Ten miles an hour 
for stage horses was very good .speed. They were not race horses. 



96 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

In 1842 this experienced driver, horse-man, in a good sense of the word, 
he quite snrelv was, settled on a farm in Ross township, and there hved a use- 
ful farmer life till July 31, 1896, then nearly eighty-two years of age. A 
daughter with her mother, her husliand, and two children, still hold the 

Adams farm. 

An Early Explorer. 

T.NMES Hill, horn in Kentucky, May 29. 1810, was not one 
of the earliest settlers, hut he was an early, a very early visitor and 
explorer in this region, and his name is entitled very justly to a place among 
these memorials of a past generation. He w'as one of the few of our citizens 
born south of the Ohio River. His father, William Hill, was a Captain of 
militia in the State of Kentucky and died in 1822. The young James Hill 
soon after made his home with the family of James Lloyd, and in 1827 they 
removed to Decatur county, Indiana. Here, in 1838, James Hill was mar- 
ried to Miss Mary Skinner of the State of New York, and here he became 
acquainted with William Ross, a resident in Decatur county. 

In February of 1834, then twenty-three years of age, four years before 
his marriage. Tames Hill made an exploring expedition into the new Indian 
Purchase, this Northwestern Indiana. He found a few white families, he 
saw tlie Indians in their wigwams, and, coming into what became Lake 
county, he found, already settled, W^illiam Ross and family, who as early as 
1833 left Decatur county and had established a home among the Indians and 
amid the wild denizens of the Deep River woodlands and the not distant 
prairie. But finding the snow-covered prairies and the leafless oaks and the 
Indian wigwams not sufficiently inviting to induce a lone young man to settle 
then, he returned to Decatur county, was married, commenced farm life, and 
deferred his actual settlement in Lake county till 1853, when the delightful 
pioneer years had passed. In Cedar Creek township, near what is now called 
Creston, he bought three hundred and twenty acres of land and there hved 
for many years, a prosperous, useful, faithful citizen. He was a very noble- 
hearted man, patient amid many trials, kindly and true and generous in the 



HISTORY 01- LAKE COUNTY. 97 

different relations of life. One daughter is living. Mrs. Henry Surprise, a 
kindly and a noble woman, and two s<ins. William J. Hill of Oregon for 
some years, a great wlieat-raiser, and now in the mining region of the West, 
and Dr. Jesse L. Hill of Creston. both possessing some of their father's excel- 
lent traits of character. Of promising grandchildren there are more than 
a few. 

Into that same Creston neighborhood, then called Tinkerville, a name 
which if not classic does not need to be forgotten, there came from the South- 
ern part of Indiana, before the railroad period began, another very useful and 
worthy family. Lymax Thompson, his wife Lucinda Thompson, a daughter, 
Laura, and two sons, Orrin and Amos Thompson. They came about 1847. 
The father and mother and daughter were active and valuable members of 
the Cedar Lake Baptist church, but the father did not live long enough to do 
a large work in building up the community. The two sons yet live, one at 
Lowell, one at Creston, good and useful men. Lymaii Thompson died Alay 

9: 1852. 

Sherman. — William Sherman, who was married at Saratoga, Xew 
York, in November, 1807, to Miss Calista Smith, a native of Vermont, came 
into Lake county in 1837. He was evidently an Eastern man, a native prob- 
ably of New England. He was the father of thirteen children and dierl in 
1843. Mrs. Sherman, who will be elsewhere mentioned, lived in Crown 
Point until October, 1884. Some one is preparing the Sherman Biography, 
which, it is expected, will soon be published. 

The living descendants of these Lake county Sherman^ numbered, a few 
years ago, tifty-two. Some have gone, some have come, and there are prob- 
ably more now. It is a lesson whicli genealogic records teach o\-er and over 
that some families increase and some become extinct. 

Griffin. Another name, although not of an early settler, claims a place 
on this page. Elihu Griffin came to Crown Point as a lawyer. He was 
working well up in his profession when the war of 1861 commenced. He en- 
tered the Union Army. He was app(jinted a paymaster. This gave him the 



98 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

title of Major. He returned to Crown Point, olitained a lucrative position 
in locating what was called the \'incennes, Danville, and Chicago Railroad. 
Disease came upon him. For many months he \\as laid aside entirely from 
the business affairs of life. He after some time resumed his office life, but 
never regained health. He had three sons, Horace, Charles F., and Cassius. 

Charles F. Griffin, brought up in Crown Point, adopted his father's 
profession, studied law, began practice in the office with his father, and from 
1887 to 1891 was at Indianapolis having been elected Secretary of State. 
After his term of office expired he located as a lawyer in the young city of 
Hammond, an<l after a prosperous course of business and sharing other hon- 
ors, honors connected with the Sons of the \'eterans, his life ended at Ham- 
mond on Saturday, December 20, 1902, while he was only in the prime of life, 
about forty-six years of age. "Ambitious and successful in obtaining several 
desired positions, never having vigorous health, he passed rapidly through a 
comparatively short life." No other Lake county boy has j^et reached so high 
a position in civil or political life. His wife, who was Miss Edith Burhans 
of West Creek township, and a son and daughter, still live in Hammond. His 
form was laid away in the Crown Point Cemetery. He had been Superin- 
tendent of the Crown Point Presbyterian Sunday-school and was a member 

of the Presbyterian church. 

Physicians. 

Doctor and Judge H. D. Palmer has been named as the first 
or earliest physician nf the county who had graduated from a medical col- 
lege. There was one, perhaps quite as early, but who proljably had no 
diploma, who administered medicine to the sick in what is now Hanover 
township, who was also a good deer hunter. Dr. Joseph Greene. As a phy- 
sician in treating the ague, called sometimes malarial fever, he was quite suc- 
cessful. His brother, Sylvester, also practiced. 

The next early physician was Dr. J.vme.s A. Wood. His home was at 
first in Porter county, but his rides often extended into Lake. He rode a 
very fine-looking Indian or French pony, thick set, with a heavy mane, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 99 

sagacious, hardy, an animal to delight a frontier lioy. and one day he was near 
the Cady ]Marsh and a patient needing a physician on the other side. Dr. 
Wood had heen told that no white man hiad ever ridden across. It was imi)lied 
that an Indian had. Time was precious. He concluded that if an Indian had 
crossed he could. He \'entured and succeeded. A \vagon road crosses now. 
Dr. Wood soon removed fn^m Porter count}" to the east side of Cedar Lake. 
He had an extensi\-e practice. 

With J. W Johns, Amsi L. Ball, and John Sykes, he was appointed a 
committee to make a report on the ^Michigan Central road when at its open- 
ing a free ride was given from Lake Station to ^Michigan City. From liim, 
without much douht the date of that event has been given as 1850; but it 
probably really was 185 1. 

After several years Dr. Wood removed to Lowell. He was for eighteen 
months Regimental Surgeon in the Twelfth Indiana Ca\alry. He had in Lake 
county a long practice. He was an excellent singer, a very pleasant, kind 
friend. 

Dr. S. B. Yeoman is one other physician to be named at Lowell, a good 
physician, an excellent man, who died in January, 1865. 

Among the physicians at Crown Point one of the earliest was Dr. Far- 
RiNGTON (W. C. or W. ¥.), from 1840 to 1856. He had quite an extensive 
ride, and was planning as an enterprising man quite an improvement to 
Crown Point as then it was when death broke up all his plans. His proper 
successor was Dr. A. J. Pratt, who came as a }-oung practitioner in 1854 
After some time he married ^Vlrs. Farrington, who had two children, a son 
and a daughter. The children were not vigorous and in young manhood 
and womanhood they passed away, and the mother also passed out from 
this life, lea\'ing Dr. Pratt with the then lonesome, lonelv home. He at 
length again married, and three daughters, one after another, came into the 
home. The children grew into womanhood, and one is the wife of Dr. 
George D. Brannon. Dr. Pratt for many years had a large practice. Accu- 
mulations increased. He became a member of the Presbyterian church, he 



100 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

was very kindly in his ministrations in the rooms of sickness, he liad brouglit 
rehef to many through his knowledge of the healing art, but in November, 
1893, soon after the close of the great Columbian Exposition, his own time 
came to die. For nearly forty years he had been one of the principal phy- 
sicians of the county and had done much good. He was born in 1825. 

Older than he as a resident physician was Dr. Harvey Pettibone, 
whose date of location at Crown Point is 1847. He was in the medical line. 
His father was a physician before him and his son after him. The Pettibone 
family came from the East, the father and three sons, Dr. Harvey, D. K., 
and \Villiam Pettibone, all for many years inhabitants of Crown Point. Dr. 
Pettibone married Mrs. H. S. Pelton and entered amid favorable circum- 
stances upon a long and successful course of medical practice. He entered 
into political life once, sufficiently long to represent Lake county in the State 
Legislature. Years, 1882-1884. He was born in Naples, New York, No- 
vember 28, 1821, he commenced the practice of medicine there about 1842; 
and his life ended here August 19, 1898, when he was nearly seventy-seven 
years of age, having been a physician for fifty-fi\-e years. 

Dr. Henry Pettibone, a son of Dr. Harvey Pettibone, may, like 
Charles F. Griffin, be properly mentioned after his father. He was born in 
Crown Point May 31, 1850, was a student with Henry Johnson at the Crown 
Point Institute, went with him to Hanover College, Indiana, graduated there 
in the scientific course, returned to Crown Point, studied medicine, secured 
f|uite a laige practice, his father gradually retiring, married Miss M. Sauer- 
man, antl died very unexpectedly at a hospital in Chicago, June 26, 1902. 
He has two sisters, both living, and two daughters. 

Dr. John Higgins is the third of the physicians of Crown Point who 
were associated together for so many years. He was born in Perry, New 
York, May 29, 1822. He was a descendant of Pilgrims and Puritans, be- 
tween whom some persons make no distinction. His Pilgrim ancestor was 
Richard Higgins, who landed at Plymouth Rock in 1621. His Puritan 
ancestor was Simon Sackett, who came to the Boston Colony in 1632. His 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 101 

fatlier was David Higgins and his mother in her girlhood was Eunice Sacl\ett 
from which family was named Sackett's Harbor on Lake Ontario. 

Graduating at an Lidiana Medical college in 1846. Dr. Higgins was 
married in 1847 to Miss Diantha Trcmper, a memlier of a Lake county 
famih' of earlv settlers. Dr. Higgins did not enter fully upon practice in 
Crown Point till 1859. In t86i he entered the I^nion Army as a physician 
and surgeon, did much hospital wnrk, became an ex]iert surgeon, and resumed 
practice at Crown Point in 1865. Like his two contemporaries his practice 
extended over considerable territory, and having a good start financially, 
like them he continued to accumulate. One daughter came to his home, 
and as the years passed on a son-in-law came, a young lawyer. J. W. Youche. 
and in the course of time a grandson came, and then for a few years the 
domestic happiness seemed complete. The young lawyer rose rapidly in 
his profession, became a State Senator, a large dwelling bou.se was erected, 
the Higgins-Youcbe mansion, and made a home of elegance without and 
within, and the grandson soon became an intelligent, promising youth. Dr. 
Higgins was growing aged. He retired from practice. He rode very much 
in his IniggA". having some fine horses, but not to visit patients. Sometimes 
one member of the family would be with him. sometimes another. P.ut 
changes come to all. They came to him. In November. 1895. the \^"ife 
who had been with him for forty-eight years passed away from earth. In 
January. 1901. the son-in-law. Hon. J. W. Youche. still in the ]M-ime of 
manhood, was cut down by the sharp sickle of death. .\nd in the early morn- 
ing of April 7. 1904. when nearh' eight\'-t\vo years of age. Dr. Higgins' 
own time came to die. 

The three had all lieen resj^ected and honored as men and as ph}'sicians. 
and all had met with hnancial success. 

Before lea\'ing this record and these memorials of early physicians two 
more names are placed r.n this ]iage. One is the name of W. E. Vii.mer, a 
German, whose dates of residence are from 1853 to 1861. Dr. Yilmer mar- 
ried a daughtei of Mr. Lewis Herlitz, of Cedar Lake. His scho(.>l of medi- 



102 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

cine was dififerent from the others wlio have lieen named. His professional 
Hfe was short. He fixed up a pleasant home and left in it. when he went 
from earth, besides his wife, two sons and one daughter. 

The other name is that of Dr. I\I. G. Bliss, coming here as a retired 
physician, opening and carrying on for som.e little time a drug store which 
was at length destroyed by fire, causing to him a great loss, and then taking 
a new course of lectures in Chicago, opening an office and acquiring" consid- 
erable practice as a physician of the Eclectic school. He had nothing on 
which to start and, unlike the others, he did not, he could not, accumulate; 
but he was for some thirty vears here a kind, good-hearted, successful phy- 
sician, a very pleasant, kindly man, and a school Trustee for many years. 
He has in Crown Point two sons and two daughters. 

A Lawyer's Record. 

The first lawyer of the county has been named in ditTerent connections, 
Alex.\xder ]\IcDox.\ld, whose home for some years was on East street, who 
died in that home in 1866, one of whose daughters is ^Irs. Belle Lathrop of 
Florida, and one Mrs. H. S. Holton, and one is the wife of Dr. Poppe, a 
physician settling here in 1870 and after some }ears removing to Chicago, 
all now living. Lawyer McDonald's date of location in Crown Point is 1839. 
Before that time he had a residence at or near what became Lowell. 

But the next lawyer, and the one whose record was here to be given, was 
Martin \\'ood. He was an earlier resident in Crown Point than ]\Iajor 
Grififin. The record is, "April 4, 1848, he came among us." The pioneer 
modes of living were soon to end, but he was well adapted to help on the 
ending and to press forward into the new. As many a young man had done 
before his day and as many have since done, he taught for a time in a public 
school. He opened a law office. His next step was to secure a partner, not 
for business but for life, and he wisely selected a minister's daughter. Miss 
Susan G. Taylor, of Pleasant Grove, to whom he was married August 26, 
1849. Besides being a lawyer and looking after the interests of his clients, he 
secured a small farm of fifty-five acres close to the town, having a taste for 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 103 

agricultuial or horitculturai pursuits. Ten acres he encldsed with ornaniental 
trees, as many as twenty varieties he put on his grounds, some of tliem quite 
rare varieties, and he set out about eiglit hundred e\'ergreens, inchuhng arbor 
vitae, red cedar, Norway spruce, Scotch pine, white pine, vellow pine, silver 
spruce, Austrian pine. Weymoutli pine, Siberian arbor \-itae. I>alsam fir. and 
juniper. He set out fruit trees to bear apples, pears, cpiinces, and peaches. 
He gave attention to small fruit. He did not neglect his law- business nor 
political life while doing all this. It will probalily be long before Crown 
Point has such another citizen lawyer as was he. There was force, energy 
in his ^•oice and movements. He spread a quantity of ink on paper when 
he wrote. His frame, as to his body, was stoutly built, compact, but not 
above medium height, and his manner, to a stranger, might have seemed 
slightly brusk. But he was the very man to contend earnestly for the cause 
he believed to be right, and was in reality of a kind and gentle disposition. 
His speeches were not polished, but in them and through them there was 
force. He acquired a large law practice and entering to some extent into 
political life he represented Lake county for two terms in the State Legis- 
lature. 

Hon. [Nlaitin Wood was born in Ohio, November 26. 1815. He died at 
his pleasant home Monday morning, September 5, 1892, being nearly seventy- 
seven years of age. He had four sons and three daughters who are all now 
living and active in the busy world, making money, gaining honors, doing 
good. 

Cleveland. Among the lawyers of Crow-n Point forty years agO' was 
one wdio came as a child into this county in 1837, a son of Ephr.\im Cleve- 
L.^ND, wdiose family were active Methodists and Sunday-school workers at 
Pleasant Grove in the very beginning of Sunday-school organization in the 
county. This child, Timothy Clevel.vxd, was born November 22, 1829, in 
the state of New York, and so was about eight years of age when the family 
came to Lake county. He passed the years of boyhood and youth at Pleasant 
Grove, settled at Crown Point as a lawyer in 1863. gave some attention to 



104 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

journalism and some to farming, published a paper, the Herald, for a short 
time, and lived to be seventy years of age. He was a man of strong Chris- 
tian principle, and manifested, when it was called out, a rare Christian spirit. 
His older daughter, Miss Helen Cleveland, was for several years a prominent 
teacher in the Crown Point pitblic school and is now the wife of Professor 
Weems of Valparaiso. The younger daughter. Miss Cynthia E.. was married 
July 17, 1898, to Mv. Joseph Baker, of Valparaiso. One son, Charles A. 
Cle\'eland, is carrying on a printing office at Hammond, and Walter W. 
Cleveland is a printer in the Star ofifice at Crown Point. Another son, 
Otis W. Cleveland, married a daughter of J. S. Holton and is living in 
Crown Point. 

The Cleveland family of the east and south is large, but where the Lake 
county family connects back in the old ancestral line is not here known. 

Another genuine Christian lawyer was James B. Turner, a member 
also of one of the true and substantial pioneer families of 1838, himself then 
a youth .seventeen years of age. He was a son of Judge Samuel Turner 
of Eagle Creek and a brother of Judge David Turner of Crown Point. He 
left the Eagle Creek farm, studied law, settled as a lawyer at Crown Point 
in :86i, established a reputation as "a very refined and a Christian man," and 
died in August, 1866. He was married in 1848 to Miss Austria C. Lindsley. 
They had no children, but adopted a boy who was called Walter Turner. 

Hon. J. W. YoucHE. A later resident than these that have just been 
named, and a much younger lawyer, was Julius W. Youcue. He was 
born March 4, 1848. m Saxony, the son of Frederick William and \\'ilhel- 
mine Pfeifer Yonche. He was brought across the Atlantic when two years 
of age, and the home of his childhood and youth was in the state of Ohio. 
The Youche family were Lutherans. In that faith he was brought up. He 
came into Lidiana and completed a course of literary studies at the State 
University at Bloomington. He then came to Crown Point as a teacher; 
was principal of the Crown Point public school in 1870. then twenty-two 
years of age. He went to Ann Arbor in Michigan, graduated at that uni- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 105 

versity as a law student in 1872. He returned to Crown Point and com- 
menced the practice of law. January i, 1873, he was married to Miss 
Eunice Higgins, the only child of Dr. Higgins, of Crown Point, and in 
that home, which l^ecame the Higgins- Youche mansion, one of the costly and 
spacious and beautiful residences of Crown Point, he resided for twenty-eight 
years. He was a model son-in-law; a good citizen; an exemplary and devoted 
husband and father; a man of refined feelings and of cultivated taste. He 
was scholarly in different lines. As a talented young lawyer he had risen 
rapidly in his profession. He was a state senator, was vice president of the 
Crown Point National Bank, was a trustee of the State University, and "was 
for many years." as said one of the best and most cultivated lawyers of the 
count)-, "easily the leader at the bar of this county, and a leader in north- 
western Indiana." He died January 2, 1901, nearly fifty-three years of age. 

Unlike one of our older lawyers he had not opened a little farm and set 
out trees and shrubbery ; but his love for nature was large, and his enjoy- 
ment of geologic and historic research was keen He had accumulated in 
his professional life quite an amount of prriperty. and had collected a large 
and valuable library. 

He has left one son, Julian Higgins Youche, now a college student, 
talented and ambitious, climbing up toward fame and success. To him and 
to his mother, to Crown Point and to Lake county, the loss of such a man 
and such a lawyer, in the prime of manhood, has been great. Of him it was 
said when he first came to Crown Point, that he was an unusually con- 
scientious and inoffensive young man, and this noble trait, to avoid giving 
ofifense, he retained through life. 

Of those representing the earliest pioneer times iv> one retained the 
peculiarities of a few settlers more fully than one well known in all Old 
Settler meetings, Amos Horxor. 

Ihe Hornor family came from the \\ ''abash region. In the eyes of 
the New England and New York children they were in appearance, in dress, 
in language, genr.ine '"Hoosiers." Most of that family in a very few years 



106 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. • 

returned to tlie Wabash, and the others from that locality, as the large Xor- 
dyke family, Wiles, Bond, and others, returned or went westward to other 
frontier regions. But Amos Hornor remained. He was born ^lay 19, 
1813. He was of Quaker descent. His father. David Hornor. continued to 
use the Quaker forms of speech. 

In 1834 a few members of the family came up and made claims in Octo- 
ber and November on the west side of the Red Cedar Lake. In the summer 
of 1S35 more members of the family came up. and Amos Hornor. then 
twenty-two years of age, came with them. They cut grass for ha}-, put up 
some cabins, and returned once more to Tippecanoe county. In November, 
1835, the Hornor and Brown families removed to Lake county, and this 
date established by documentary evidence, the Claim Register, marks the 
commencement of Amos Hornor's residence in the county. He was quite 
desirous at one time of being considered the first or one of the first settlers 
in the county only second to Solon Robinson and a \ery few others. But no 
man can go back of the testimony of the Claim Register, on whatever points 
it gives testimony. 

After the return of his father's family to the Wabash Amos Hornor 
resided for some time at Crown Point. Soon he was married to Miss Mary 
White, one of the }oung belles of Crown Point, daughter of ^Irs. Sally 
Wliite. afterward Mrs. \\'olf, of Porter county. The marriage took place 
in Porter county, July 4. 1844. She lived less than a year. And he was 
again married. June 24, 1849, to a widow woman now. and not a young girl, 
Mrs. Sarah R. Brov>n. He made his final Imme at Ross, and with her he 
lived many peaceful years. They had two daughters. One is not now living. 
I\Irs. Sarah Horner at length died, and a third wife, Airs. Amanda M. Co- 
burn, January 10, 1892, took the vacant place. 

In a few years his own time came, and Amos Hornor. of Ross, the last 
representati\-e of the Hornor and Brown families of 1835, departed from 
among the living August 25, 1895, nearly eighty-two years of age. For al- 
most sixty years he had trodden the soil of Lake county and amid all the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 107 

change? of the last half of the Xineteenth Century he retained to a large 
extent the characteristics of h'S youth. In all Old Settler meetings at Crown 
Point and at Hehron he took a large interest and was always ready to rehearse 
tlie experiences of early years. 

B.\LL. — The name. .\msi L. Ball, occurs c|uite frequently in the earliest 
history of Lake county. He was one of the more mature men active and 
prominent in laying the foundations of civil and social institutions. He 
came with his son, John B.a.ll, from the State of New Y'ork in 1836. To 
which band of the large family of Balls emigrating from England between 
1630 and 1640 he belonged is net known. In March, 1837, an election was 
held at his house, also at the house of Russell Eddy and at the house of 
Samuel D. Bryant, at which election, having received seventy-eight votes 
for county Commissioner, he was elected for three years ; but he resigned 
this office in the summer in order to be a candidate at the August election 
for Representative to Indianapolis. Lake cixmty voted for him, l>ut Porter 
county, with which Lake for some years was united in electing a Repre- 
sentative, did not. He gave up a certaintv for an uncertainty and so lost 
both offices. He was rather tall in person, a fluent speaker, a man capable 
and ambitious. He was, as the political parties of those days were desig- 
nated, a Democrat, and Solon Robinson, who had been the "Squatter King" 
of Lake, was a strong Whig. Politically these two, both ambitious men, 
were not friendly, and each had the credit in those days of defeating to 
some extent the political aspn^ations of the other. Amsi L. Ball, while not 
holding office, continued to be an influential and prominent citizen, luit, 
about 185 1 or soon after, he returned to the State of New York after a resi- 
dence here of about fifteen years. Of his son's sojourn here but little is 
known. 

Jones. — Levi D. Jones, whose name is on record as a grand juror at the 
first term of the Lake Circuit Court, in 1837, must have been an early settler, 
but further records concerning him have not been found. 

Damd Tones vv-as an earlv resident in Porter countv and then near the 



108 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Hurlhurt Corners, and, retiring from his farm life at length, he li\-ed for 
many years on East street in Crown Poin.t, an exemplary chnrch .memher 
and a quiet citizen, where he died in 1895. He had se\'eral children, of whom 
one son and one daughter live in Crown Point. 

W. G. ]\IcGl.\shon, who came to Crown Point in 1846, was very closely 
identified with the business interests of the town for manv vears. He was 
some of the tune clerk or salesman, and his positions will indicate some of 
the business houses of former years. In 1850 he became clerk for \\'illiam 
Alton, then a leading merchant. Afterward he was clerk for Turner S: 
Bissel, successors to J- W. Dinwnddie; then for D. Turner; for Turner & 
Cramer : and for Strait. He was in these stores for four years. Then he 
was in the store of A. H. Merton, successor to Turner & Cramer: then 
clerk for John G. Hoffman. In these two stores for three years. It was 
now 1S58 and he went into business for himself. In i860 he bought a stock 
cf goods in Boston and then took in as a> partner M. L. Barber. 

He kept the postoffice, and when the railroad came through the town 
he did the express business. He next bought out M. L. Barber, and at 
length closed out his business and in 1867 retired to a farm about four miles 
south of town. In 1871 he returned to the town and to business life. He 
at last Avent to the A^/est and died there, a very aged man. 

He was rather low in stature and quite portly. A true man. He was 
born in Quebec, October 19, 1814, was married in Vermont in 1833, and 
lived to be eighty-two years of age. That Vermont wife, Mrs. McGlashon, 
is still living with an unmarried daughter in the West. Her great-grand- 
children live at Hammond, the children of Dr. Turner. 

Summers. — Among those who have aided largely in building up Crown 
Point and the county the name of Zer.mi F. Summers is prominent. He 
was a son of Judge Benjamin Summers, of Ohio, and was born in Ver- 
milion, Erie county, Ohio. July iCi. 1829. He came to Crown Point, where 
he had several relatives, in November, 1854. He had received a good 
business education, which included also surveying and civil engineering. 




HERMAN C. BECKMAN 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 109 

In 1S55 and 1856 he assisted the county surveyor, Jolm Wheeler, wlio was 
one of his relatives, and with him in 1857 bought out the Crown Point 
Herald and issued. August 4, 1857. the first number of the Crown Point 
Register. He was elected count}- Clerk in 1859 and held that office till 
1867. He also held other offices, as school Examiner, town Trustee, and 
was appointed real estate appraiser for the county. In 18^)5 he erected a 
warehouse near the railroad depot and commenced shipping grain. He also 
erected a grain building at Le Roy, then called Cassville. and bought and 
shipped grain. In this grain liusiness he continued until his death in 1879. 
He had spent several months, probably in 1869 and 1870, as surveyor and 
civil engineer, on the line of what was then called the Vincennes, Danville, 
and Chicago Railroad, a business for which he was well fitted. About one 
half of his life, nearly twenty-five years, was given to different interests in 
Crown Point and the region around, and the results of his work and influence 
will long remain. 

He took a large interest in the North Street Baptist church, of which 
he was a Trustee and where his daughters attended Sunday school, and for 
which, had he continued to live, he would have no doubt done much more. 

Pie came to Crown Point when twenty-five years of age. August 2, 
i860, he was married to Miss Margaret M. Thomas, a daughter of Ambrose 
S. Thomas, Esq., of New York. One son, an only son, Wayland Summers, 
is living in the West, and a daughter, Mrs. Jennie Webster, lives in Chicago. 

In a somewhat lengthy memorial in "The Lake of the Red Cedars" he 
is well called an active, upright, useful, honorable citizen; a kind, obliging, 
faithful friend; a loving, generous, tender husband and father; with a very 
refined and noble nature. In his official and business life he enjoyed \-ery 
largely the confidence of his fellow citizens throughout the county. 

Beckman. — The principal merchant in Hanover tinvnship, first at Han- 
over Center and then at Brunswick, was Herman C. Bfxkman. He was 
born in 1822, he came to America in 1S46, he was married in 1852, he com- 
mencetl business as a merchant in 1855, he was elected countv Commis- 



no HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

sionei" in 1867. he was postmaster at Brunswick for twenty-nine years, he 
accumulated a good amount of property, and died at Brunswick in 1894, an 
upright, kindly, highly respected citizen. He had several children who 
became estimable members of society and are li\ing now. 

Livingstone or Livingston. — Xcar the beginning of the railroad period 
there came from Europe to Lake county S.\muel and Jane Livingston. 
There were nine sons, Robert, John, Sam, Joseph, James, \\'illiam, Hart- 
ford. Thomas, and ]\Ioses. Six of these sons went as soldiers in the Union 
Armv. There were three daughters, in all twelve children, making another 
quite fair-sized family in the county. The mother, Mrs. Jane Livingston, 
died in February. 1879, and the father in ]\Iarch of the same year. 

Robert Livingston, who was married fifty or more years ago. had 

ten children, two sons called Sam and Moses, and eight daughters, yimiy 

of the daughters became teachers in the public schools of the county, and 

at length married and became active women in domestic and social and 

religious life. Robert Livingston, living for many years on a farm a mile 

west of Crown Point, died October 13. 1895, nearly eighty-six years of age. 

He was born near Belfast in L-eland. of Scotch-Presbyterian descent, and 

was a member of the Twentieth Regiment of Indiana Volunteers in our 

Civil war. 

Family Lines from Scotland. 

While many of our early settlers were descendants of Pilgrims and 
Puritans and Quakers or Friends, and of Scotch-Irish, who had lived for 
several generalions m Xew England and New York and Pennsylvania, there 
were others whose ancestors came from Scotland but a few generations ago. 
Three of these closely connected families bear the names of Fisher, Brown, 
and \\'.\LL.\CE, and for the genealogy here given I am much indebted to 
"Lake County, 1884," a book containing many valuable records, but now 
"out of print." 

Fisher. — Alexander Fisher was born in Ayr, Scotland, in 1801, and 
came to Montreal in 18 18, and soon after went into Schenectady county, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. Ill 



New York, and there, in 1819, was married to ^liss Agnes Brown, who was 
bom at Paisley, in Scotland, and was a danghter of Alexander Brown, who 
came to the United States in 1S05. 

Alexander Fisher and Agnes Brown were commencing American life 
almost in their youth. They had eight children. Three of their sons and 
one daughter hecame residents of Lake county, Lidiana. One of these, 
William Fisher, born in 1825, is now living at Hebron in Porter county. 

Thomas Fisher became a resident here in 1851. He was married to 
Miss Mary Brown, daughter of another Alexander Brown, a settler at South- 
east Grove. He was for many years engaged in the manufacture of brooms 
at Crown Point. He liecame quite wealthy. He had no children. 

John Fisher, the third of these three sons of Alexander Fisher from 
Scotland, was born in Schnectady county, New York, in 1832, became a 
resident in this county in 1855, and was married in 1865 to Miss Joanna 
\\'illey, a danghter of Mr. George \\'illey, of Hanover township. He was 
a surveyor and held the office of county surveyor for many years. He had 
many excellent traits of character. He was a generous friend. He took a 
large interest, as did the Willey family, in the Association of Old Settlers. 
He became a member, in his later life, of the Presbyterian church. He died 
March 7, 1897, leaving one son, George \\'. Fisher, to occupy his place in 
the Masonic lodge and as county surveyor, in the activities of life, and, per- 
haps some day, in the church. 

Brown. — Alexander Brown, who came to the United States in 1805, 
has been already mentioned. Besides his daughter Agnes, who also has 
been mentioned, he had a son named John. This John Brown, bearing a name 
that is noted in the martyr history of Scotland and England, had six sons 
and two daughters. One of his sons, Alexander F. Brown, was born in 
1804, August 25th, Ijefore his grandfather. Alexander, came to America, 
was married in 1835. and became a resident of this county, at Southeast 
Grove, in 1840. He was going on prosperously, with his Scotch enterprise 
and industry, when his life was unexpectedly terminated in 1849. He left 



112 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

three sons and two daughters, two of the sons and the daugliters are now 
living in Crown Point. TItc sons and one daughter are among the wealthy 
citizens. 

There came also to Southeast Grove in 1840 a brother of Alexander 
F. Brown, another of the six sons of John Brown of Scotland, who was 
known as John Brown, Jr. He was never married. He made his home for 
many years with the Crawford family west of the Grove, which home was 
near liis farm. He was quite a prominent citizen. 

Yet another of those six sons, William Brown, the youngest probably 
of the six, also came to Southeast Grove, but as he is still living his record 
does not come in here. 

George Brown, the youngest son of A. F. Brown, was born May 5, 
1849, the year in which his father died. He was married in 1869 to jNIiss 
Turner, of Eagle Creek township, a sister of ^Irs. T. Pearce; he continued 
farm life at the Grove; became interested and active in Sunday-school life; 
and died June 21, 1878, leaving three sons. Alexander, \\'illiam, and Herbert. 

The record of the two living sons, John Brown and William Barringer 
Brown, of Crown Point, is to be found elsewhere. 

Wallace. — This name, so fully interwoven in the history of Scotland, 
calls to mind the old days of Robert Bruce and Sir William Wallace and the 
heroes and patriots of that age. 

Lyman Wallace, the first of the Lake county Wallace family in Amer- 
ica, was born in Washington county, New York, in 1800. His first wife 
was a native of Vermont, and had one son, William Wallace, and three 
daughters. Hi'-, second wife was also a native of Vermont. She was burn 
May 4, 1798. She became the mother of five daughters. He came with his 
wife and these daughters to Southeast Grove in 1843 from Genessee county. 
New York. He died at Southeast Grove in 185 1. Four of the daughters 
became mistresses of families, Mrs. John Dinwiddie, Mrs. Starr, Mrs. William 
Brown, and Mrs. Parkinson. 

The influence of these closely connected families has been large on the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 113 

material interests of Lake county, extending through more tlian sixty years. 

Some of its members have been active also in church and educational lines, 

and they have all taken a commendalile interest in the Association of early 

Settlers. 

English Settlers. 

Jonas Rhodes was one of those early settlers, the Woods brothers, the 
Haywards. the Muzzall family, and a few others, who from among the "cot- 
tage homes" and the "stately homes" of fair old England, of which Mrs. 
Hemans has so beautifully written, came to found for themselves new homes 
as beautiful as they might make them, in this, if not a fairer, yet certainly 
a broader, a much more roomy land, this land we call America. 

Jonas Rhodes made his settlement in 1837. not on the border of one of 
those prairies which were to the New Englanders generally so beautiful and 
so attractive, but on the sand ridge and amid the wooded growth of what 
is now Calumet township ; and a little place that has lately sprung up, 
called Glen Park, is near what was his early home. Without knowing what 
would take place in a few years he selected a location near which more than 
one railroad line now passes. The years passed with him as with others 
busily and pleasantly engaged. Children grew up in his home. He did his 
part in developing the resources of the county, aiding enterprises that were 
good, prospering in his activities of life, and reaching a good age. He 
was a pleasant man with whom to meet. He was much interested in the 
first published history of Lake county, and once remarked that he thought 
the weather record it contained was worth the whole price of the book. He 
has in this county a number of descendants. 

H.\vw.\RD — Five brothers by the name of Hayward, and not the tra- 
ditional three, came over from England and settled, in 1837, i" Lake county, 
Indiana. These were called in their father's home Charles, Thomas, Henry, 
Alfred, and Edwin. 

Charles Hayward settled a little distance from what is now the stone 
church of Ross township. His brother, Thomas Hayward, settled not far 
eastward towards Hobart. The other three brothers, settling in the same 



lU HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

part of the county, not far from the claim of Bartlett \\'oods, are still living in 
the ^^'est. 

A son of Charles Havward is Edwin Hayward. the second in this 
county to bear that name, and two sons, George Hayward living near Hobart, 
and Oliver Hayward, are the two sons of Thomas Hayward, who died in 
March. 1904. after a residence in the county of sixty-six full years. 

Thomas Muzzall. also from England, with a mother and two sisters, 
residing a short time m Canada, became also a settler in the same neighbor- 
hood in 1837. All these English families became good Americans and valu- 
able citizens. They all selected the same part of the county a little north 
of the prairie belt. Their descendants are now among the prosperous and 
enterprising citizciis of Crown Point and Hobart and the far ^\'est. 







Charles M.\r\ix, a pioneer of 1S36, was born August 4, 181 1, in 
Norwich, Connecticut. In his young manhood he spent about two years in 
South Carolina, visited Xew Orleans, went up to Alton and then to Lock- 
port in Illinois, in 1S33. In 1835 ^^^ ^^'^^ married to Miss Charlotte Perry, 
and with her mother came into the western edge of Indiana in 1836. He and 
Mrs. Perrv located claims, and those claims were included in Lake county 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 115 

when that was organized. He sold his first farm, now in Hanover, near 
Brunswick, to Henry Sasse, Sr., alwut 1839. In 1851, then a widower, he 
was married to Miss Ehza Fuller, a daughter of Mr. H. S. Fuller, of West 
Creek. Ahout 1881 he sold his second large and valuable farm and bought 
the old Judge \\'ilkinson place, where he built a stately residence. He there 
died in 1892, nearly eighty-one years of age. He was a noble example of 
true manhood and was noted among Lake county pioneers for the urbanity 
of his manners. He was a true gentleman. He had no children. He had 
.some kindred at L(ick])ort, and there his body was taken for burial, although 
for fifty-six years he had been a citizen of Lake. 

Jackson, Farley. — Two New York or New England families, that be- 
came closely connected by marriage, came in the true pioneer days to the 
southwestern part of the county, and helped to form what became known 
as the West Creek neighborhood. 

Joseph Jackson, coming here from Michigan in 1837, was born in 
1793, probably in New England, but lived for some time in New York State, 
and then in ^Michigan. In the spring of 1837 he came and located his claim, 
in the summer he came again with liis son, Clinton Jackson, and his son's 
family; and removed with his own family in October, 1837, from Monroe 
county, ^Michigan, to Lake county, Indiana. They came with teams, and 
were nearly three weeks on the way. There was an early snow that fall, 
and on the first morning of their journey they f(jund the ground covered 
with snow. They had started on a warm, bright, October afternoon. Mr. 
Jackson took with him some dr\- goods and groceries and opened the first 
store in that part of the county. 

In 1838 a schoolhouse was built, and one of the family. Miss Ursula 
Ann Jackson, became teacher of the first school in what is now West Creek 
township, .\fter sex'cral years of farm life the family removed to Crown 
Point, put up l)uildings, kept hotels, and the father, J. Jackson was for one 
term the fir'^t county Auditor. After a residence in this county of nearly 
twenty years, an active, useful, very substantial citizen, in the spring of 1857 



111! HISTORY OV LAKE COUXTV. 

he rcniovecl to Iowa, lie was lor two terms of office Mayor of the city of 
Wapello, and lived to be nearly ninety-five years of age. 

Benjamin Farley came with his family to the West Creek neighbor- 
hood also in 1837. He was born in 1781. in Xew York, and came to this 
coiintv from the State of New York, and was when he settled here well on 
in middle age. He had five sons and two daughters. He lived here only a 
few vears. His tombstone is m the West Creek cemetery. One of his sons, 
Zebulon Pierce Farley, was married to jMiss Amarilla \^aleria Jackson, 
daughter of Joseph Jackson. Z. P. Farley, bom April 14. 1821. is still 
living, but not now in this county. In our civil history and in our Masonic 
history the name of Farley will remain. 

Hatuawav. Haydex. — Into this same \\'est Creek neighborhood there 
came two other families having now many living descendants and repre- 
sentatives. Peter Hathaway was tlie head of one of these families and 
Nehemiah Hayden of the other. Peter Hatliaway. a native of Xew Jersey, 
was born, according to one record, in March. 17S2. was married in Xew 
Jersey, came into New Y^'ork and about 1839 became a citizen of this county. 
Three sons are named in the early Sunday-school history of the county, Silas, 
Abram, and Bethuel ; and there were probably several other children. Indeed, 
one record sajs there were twelve in all. of sons and daughters. The mem- 
bers of this large, pioneer family were active church and Sunday-school work- 
ers; and worthy successors of such a valuable family reside in the same 
neighborhood now, members of the third and fourth generation. 

Xehemiah Hay'den was a pioneer settler of 1837. 

Some other early settlers of this same neighborhood were Henry Tor- 
rey. in 1837, — a bridge across \\'est Creek in 1838 was called the Torrey 
bridge: John Kitchel, settling probably in 1836, of whom not much is 
now known: AniN Sanger, a settler of 1838: and X^. Spalding. 

This West Creek or Hathaway and Hayden neighborhood soon became 
a very prosperous portion of the county, and a flourishing religious center. 
Here was erected one of the earliest church buildings of the county. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 117 

Spalding. — Heman M. Spaujinc. .'iie of nine cliiklren of Heinan 
Spalding of New England, settled in Lake county in .\ugust, 1837. in the 
Hathaway and Hayden neighlxjrhood. He had five sons and four daughters. 
One of the sons is Joshua P. Spalding, of Orchard Grove, and one is Dr. 
Heman Spalding, of Chicago. Tiie father was born in 1809. He was a good 
citizen. 

Sanford D. Ci.akk. — l<"ur many years one of the noble, useful, exem- 
plary citizens of Crown Point, Sanford D. Clark, was not a pioneer settler. 
In our earlier years of settlement he was a prosperous merchant in Ohio, 
and in the spring of 1839, before the land sale, he came to this countv on 
horseback, and furnished some relatives and acquaintances with money for 
entering several claims. For himself, so far as land was concerned, he 
seems to have made no provision. Near the beginning of the railroad period 
he became a resident of Crown Point: from 1864 to 1872, be was county 
Recorder; he took a deep interest in the war for the Union, and especially 
in the discourses of the three resident pastors, J. L. Lower, T. C. Stringer, 
and T. H. Ball, being himself what was called an "abolitionist'" in those 
days of conflict of opinion, and approving of "the underground railroad." 
thoroughly religious, a member with his wife of the Presbyterian church. 
very unselfish, true-hearted. 

He at length removed to a western state and li\ed to be ninety or more 
years of age. Valuable in the society of Crown Point was bis life for the 
many years while he remained here, and in these memorials of useful citizens 
it well deserves a place. 

Patten or Patton. — John H. Patten, as he wrote the name, born 
January 10. 1801, came to Lake county from the East in fulv, 1852, after 
the real ])ioneer days had ended and much of tlie foundation work in building 
up society had been done, yet his family found sufficient work for them in 
the railroad periofl then coming on. He bad nine .sons and seven daughters, 
but only seven of the sons became residents here for much length of time 
and five of the daughters. 



lis HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Of tlie third and fourth generations there are now many members of 
this large family and they write the name Patton. The father, J. H. Patten, 
died in November, 1865, and Mrs. Patten, his wife, born in 1799, died in 
May, 1867. She was probably the mother of more children than any other 
woman who has lived and died in tliis county. 

Three of the sons, Seymour Patton. James Patton, and Joseph Patton, 
are still living in the county, and one of the seven daughters, IMrs. Colby, 
lives in Crown Point with her daughter, the wife of the lawyer, J- Frank 
Meeker. The Christmas and New Year's family dinners have been in years 
past large and interesting gatherings. 

Bryant. — The Bryants, Bryant Settlement and Pleasant Grove, have 
been mentioned in the Outline History. David Bryant made a settlement 
in 1835 at Pleasant Grove, but was not a permanent resident. His wife 
died in March. 1836, and. although he was married again, in the spring of 
1838 he removed to Bureau county, Illinois, and staid some years. He then 
went to Missouri and lived there a few years, returned to Illinois, then went 
to Ohio, probably to his earlier home and staid five years, and then again, 
in 1853, became a resident of this county. In 1854 he brought into the 
county one thousand and sixty-three sheep. He went again to Illinois for 
a short time, and returned, and again made visits there. He made his last 
Lake comity home with his daughter. Mrs. William Fisher, then living at 
Eagle Creek, now in Hebron. A younger daughter, a Lake county girl for 
a number of years, is still living in this state, Mrs. Ora Doddrige. 

Mr. Brvant was a very sociable, friendly man. of religious principle, 
and a church member. Born about 1797. It was said of him when seventy- 
five vears of age, "He is growing feeble, but retains the use of his mental 
faculties.'" His memorial belongs to this county of Lake. 

Of the five Bryants who commenced in 1835 the Bryant Settlement, 
and some of whom gave to the grove the name Pleasant, Simeon Bryant. 
David Bryant, E. Wayne Bryant. Samuel D. Bryant, and Elias Bryant, who 
joined the others in the fall of 1835, few of them seem to have made it a 
permanent home. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 119 

Simeon Bryant staid about one year and removed to Indian Town, 
over the line in Porter county, soutli of the present town of Hebron, and 
there made his permanent home as a citizen of Porter. 

Samuel D. Bryant returned to the original home in Ohio and staid 
a few years, then came again to Lake county and bought at length, in 1854, 
a farm south of Southeast Grove, near what is now the Center School House, 
and there spent the remainder of his days, living to be more than eighty 
years of age. 

Elias Bryant, according to a Porter county history, died on the Pleas- 
ant Grove farm, but a son. Robert Bryant, in 1854, settled in Porter county, 
south of Hebron, where many Bryant families now reside. They have 
crossed over from Lake into Porter. 

E. Wayne Bryant, who had a brother, Jacob Bryant, living in LaPorte 
county, a pioneer of that countv. arranged for a family home in the Grove. 
As earlv as the fall of 1836 he provided a room for a school, where the 
children of the Settlement were taught by Mr. Bell Jennings, "a veiw excel- 
lent man." He also aided in starting a Sunday school for the children in 
1838 or 1839. He was a valuable pioneer. He bought some hand mill- 
stones of Lyman Wells, another early settler, and in the winter of 1836 and 
1837 had them arranged to be run by horse power, and ground corn and 
buckwheat for all the neighbors. This little mill continued to- grind for two 
or three years, and at one time there were in the mill, so^ says one of the 
family, over three hundred bushels of grain waiting to be ground. 

Miller. — There was beyond any room for doubt an early mill seat 
found and a mill built on Deep River. The Claim Register, which is author- 
ity, says : "^\'illiam Crooks and Samuel Miller in Co. Timber and Mill 
Seat." Claim made in June, 1835, but settled in November, 1834. Locality, 
Section 6, Township 35, Range 7. W. Crooks from Alontgomery county. 
This William B. Crooks was elected, in 1837, Associate Judge, and a "Per- 
mit" v/as granted, July 31, "to Samuel Miller to retail foreign merchandise 
at his store on Deep River." Tliat he had a mill and a store is certain; but 



120 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

of himself very little is known. It is said, and this is tradition and not 
history, and for its accuracy no good authority can be named, that his wife 
was part Indian, that he had sold property at Michigan City for eighty thou- 
sand dollars in gold and silver, and that much whiskey, as well as other 
articles of "foreign merchandise," was sold at his store. This last particular 
is no doubt true. If the gold and silver tradition is true, he must have been 
the most wealthy adventurer who came into the county in those early years. 
He made no long stay at that store but sold it to A. Hopkins, who soon sold 
it to H. Young, and he sold the mill irons to a mill builder, and for himself 
opened a gun shop which he kept for several years. 

A gravel road crosses Deep River now at this locality and a few years 
ago some of the old timbers of Miller's mill could still be seen in the waters. 
Somewhere there may be descendants of this Samuel Miller. 

Note. — Since the above was written there has come into my hands a 
little book of autobiography by Dr. James Crooks, a son of Judge William 
B. Crooks, who it seems was also a physician, and Dr. James Crooks says 
that his father settled at Michigan City in the spring of 1834. This James 
Crooks was then eight years of age. He says that Samuel Miller was then 
the principal business man of that place, that he "owned considerable real 
estate, houses, a store, warehouse, and a schooner." He also says that his 
father. Dr. W. B. Crooks, removed into what became Lake county in Novem- 
ber, 1834. and that in the spring of 1835 his father and Samuel Miller com- 
menced building a mill on Deep river. After narrating many interesting 
recollections of his childhood in Lake county he at length says that his 
father .sold out, in the spring of 1838, "his possessions in Lake county to 
Samuel Miller of Michigan City," for one thousand dollars, and that five 
hundred dollars was paid "in gold." So Miller must have had some gold. 
He further adds that "Miller failed a short time afterwards." In June of 
1838 the Crooks family left Lake county. 

RuFUS Hill, an early resident in Pleasant Grove, perhaps as early as 

1839, is noted for having one of the ^■ery largest families in the county. 

Credible authority gives the number of his children to be twenty-two. These 

were not all the children of one woman. The names of six of his older sons 

were Welcome, William, John, Charles, INIartin, and Richard. There were 

six daughters of corresponding age, and then younger sons and daughters 

that made up the number. He lived to be over eighty years of age. 




JOSEPH A. LITTLE 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 121 

New Hampshire Settlement. 

Joseph A. Little, son of Captain Thomas Little, was the seventh in 
descent from George Little who came from London to Newbury, Massa- 
chusetts, in 1640. The given names of his ancestors were, George, Moses, 
Tristam, Enoch, Jesse, Thomas. The names of sixty-five hundred descend- 
ants of George Little have been collected. 

The family of Thomas Little came into the then open and wild and 
beautiful center of Lake Prairie, and with the Gerrish, Ames, Peach, Plumer, 
and Morey families, formed wliat was known as the New Hampshire Settle- 
ment. The Wason family was soon added to the number. 

Joseph A. Little was torn in Merrimack county. New Hampshire. May 
24, 1830. In 1859 he was married to Miss Mary Gerrish. He became a suc- 
cessful farmer and large wool-grower, keeping large flocks of fine wool sheep. 
He represented Lake county in the Indiana Legislature in 1886 and 1887, 
secured excellent farms for his sons in the Kankakee lowlands, and was laid 
aside from a life of acti\-ity and usefulness by the messenger, death, February 
19, 1892. In the records of the Association of Old Settlers his name is in- 
erasibly written. He had three sons and three daughters. 

Abiel Gerrish, one of those men of mature age who came from New 
Hampshire to Lake county, was also the se\'enth in descent from Captain 
William Gerrish, who settled in Newbur)-, Massachusetts, in 1639. The given 
names of the men in this line are: William. Moses, Joseph, who had thirteen 
children, and who \\'as accustomed to swim across the Merrimack River near 
its mouth every year till he was over seventy }'ears of age, Stephen, Henry, 
Hem-y, Jr., and Abiel, who came to Lake Prairie. He was born March 7, 
1806. at Boscawen, New Hampshire. His mother was Mary Fo.ster, daughter 
of Hon. Abiel Foster, of Canterbury, and her mother was Mary Rogers, 
daughter of Rev. Daniel Rogers, of Exeter, New Hampsliirc. who was the 
sixtli in descent fnmi jdhn Fiogers, of London, who was burned at Smithfiekl, 
Fel)ruary 14, 1535, the first martyr in the reign of the "l)Ioody Queen Mary." 
The first was one of those ''small childien." as represented in that pictured 



123 HISTORY OF L.\KE COUNTY. 

group upon which so many Xew England children have looked, who on that 
dark day in England's histon.- stood with their mother near the nKirt\T"s stake. 
The seoMid was Rev, John Rogers, of Dedham. who died in 1639. The third 
was Rev. Xathaniel Rogers, who came to America in 1636. The fourth 
was ]tim Rogers. President once of Har\-ard College. The fifth was Rev. 
John Rogers, of Ipswich. The sixth was Rev. Daniel Rogers, of Exeter. 
The seventh, in this line, wiis his daughter Mar\- Rc^rs. The eighth was 
Mar}- Gerrish. wife of Henr\- Gerrish. who had five daughters and two sons. 
.\nd the ninth was the younger of these sons. Abiel Gerrish. who became 
a citiioi of the county of Lake, a descendant of a noted martjT and also of 
a long line of worthy ancestors. His wife, a very deAX»ted Christian woman, 
died in September. iSSi. the two having celebrated in 1880 their golden 
wet^ '---c "-^niversar\-. and he died in June. 1SS4, The\- had one son and 

five :>,..;ers. One daughter became the w-fe ,^' Hon. Josepli A. Little, 

and still li\-es in the prairie home. 

The head of another of these seven Xew Hampshire families was S.\muel 
Ames. His descent is from Jacob Ames, of Canterburj-. Xew Hampshire. 
His son was Samuel Ames, bom in 1724. His oldest son was Joseph Ames, 
bom in 1771. One of his six scxis was Samuel Ames, who came to Lake 
Prairie, who was bom July 14, 1813, in Xew Hampshire. He represented 
Lake o^unty in the Legislamre some years ago. His scaa. Edward P. Ames, 
li\-es ir. He died a few years ago at Elkhart, where Mrs. Ames 

and his cmiy daugiiJer now reside. 

Rev. H. W.\sox. who spoit many acti\-e years in pastoral life in West 
Creek towTiship, after retiring from the re^)onsibilities of a pastor's duties, 
gave quite a little attenticm to fanning along w^ith his one son. and he too 
was chosei by the \-oters of the coimt>- ut represent than at Indianapolis. It 
was certainly creditable to the majorit}- of the citizens of the couoitj- that 
they sent three such thorough!}.' religious men, in the course of a few }-ear5, 
frc«i the same not large neighborhood, men of Xew England birth and Xew 
England training- 'o represent them in the L^slature. Such men as cit-zens 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 123 

are everywhere valuable. The readers of these memorials must have noticed 
how many of tlie earlier settlers were of New England and so of English 
descent. 

WiLLEY. — Another pioneer from the State of New York was George 
WiLi-EY. He was born in Connecticut, April 3, 1814, but when four years 
oi age his home was removed to the State of New York. His father w-as 
Jeremiah Willey, of Connecticut, born in 1777, and his grandfather was David 
Willey, both bearing Bible names, as did so many of the children of New 
England. 

George Willey, brought up in the State of New York, receiving the train- 
ing of the N^ew York schools, well informed in regard to some of the higher 
institutions of learning in that State, was married in 1835 ^ Miss Cynthia 
Nash, and came with her and a party of settlers in 1838 to the western limit 
of Lake county. He made his home near the present Klassville, in what 
was West Creek township but is now in Hanover. George Almeron Willey, 
the one living son, has a home now in St. Louis. His oldest daughter, Mrs. 
Jolin Fisher, resides in Crown Point. Two other daughters are living, but 
not in Indiana. The family removed from the farm many years ago, and 
Mr. Willey erected a spacious dwelling house near Crown Point, where his 
life closed .■\pril 5, 1884, while he was Chairman of the Committee of .\r- 
rangements for the Semi-Centennial celebration of the county. He was 
seventy years of age. He had taken a good interest in the jubilee celebration, 
and would have enjoyed it had he lived. 

Jeremi.\h Wiggins was an early settler where is now Merrillville, but 
the exact date of his settlement seems not to he known. He gave name to 
the woodland where he made his claim, which for some time was known as 
Wiggins' Point. Southwest from it, across the prairie, was Brown's Point, 
and at the south, across the prairie about five miles distant from Wiggins' 
Point, there grew up in the edge of the woodland, Crown Point. 

J. Wiggins probably came in 1836. In 1837 his claim passed into the 
hands of E. Saxton. Fie was with Mr. Saxton in 1838 and soon disappears 



124 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

from any of tlie county records. He seems to !:a\-e been a lone man without 
mucli connection with any one, but that he was hving in 1838 is abundantly 
certain. 

Taylor, Edgerton, Palmer. — In 1836 a quite large family connection 
commenced a settlement on the east side of the Red Cedar Lake where were 
then many cedar trees. The head of this family was Obadiah Taylor, born 
in Massachusetts, who removed to New- York, afterward to Pennsylvania, 
and came at last to Lake county, an aged man, where he died in 1839. 

A son, Adonijah Taylor, born in New- York in 1792, was one of these 
early settlers; PIorace Taylor, another son, born in 1801, was also one of 
this group : Horace Edgerton, a son-in-law, having lived for some years 
in Pennsylvania, was a third of these men; each of these having several chil- 
dren, and all, with the family of Mrs. Miranda Stillson, a daughter of Obadiah 
Ta\lor, and the family of James Palmer, a son-in-law, born in Connecticut, 
a soldier in the ^^'ar of 1812, but coming later than the others into this 
county, forming the large Cedar Lake and then Creston community. These 
who have been named, active and useful in their day, have passed away, 
and some of their children, as Albert Taylor, Obadiah Taylor, Amos Edger- 
ton and Alfred Edgerton, have grown old in this county and followed their 
fathers into the unseen world. Also DeWitt Clinton Taylor, born in 1826, 
died some years ago, not very aged then. But there remain grandchildren and 
great-grandchildren, members sufficient in these lines to hand these names 
down to other generations. Those who ha\e gone will be remembered by 
what they have done. Of New England stock, they were not idlers in the 
world's great w-orkshop. 

Many family lines have been traced back for several generations by the 
inhabitants of this county, .\mong others is the line of Wise or W'eise. 

Before 1750, the date not known, the ancestors of the present Wise family 
came to Pennsylvania. John George W'eise and his wife, ^Irs. Eve W'eise, 
were living in that State in Philadelphia count}', where was Ijorn, December 
-3- 1 75 1' '1 •'^o"' Adam W'eise. For a given name his parents could go no 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 125 

further back in the -world's history. The family were members of the Evan- 
gelical Lutheran church. 

.\ilam W'eise was married February 2, 1772, to Margaret Elizabeth Win- 
gard. February i, 1799, he was commissioned by the Governor Justice of the 
Peace, one sentence in the rather lengthy and peculiar commission being "To 
have and to hold this Commission, and the Office hereby granted unto you the 
said Adam Wise so long as you shall behave yourself well." As "he remained 
in office," so the record says, "thirty-four years, or until his death in 1833," 
it is evident that he did beha\e himself well. 

It appears also that the Governor gave to his name at that time the 
English form which most of the family have since retained. Adam \Vise 
w-as, when he died, October 5, 1833, in the eighty-second year of his age, 
and had eleven children, sixty-three grandchildren, and one hundred and 
thirty-tliree great-grandchildren, and it is claimed that his descendants are 
now in nearly every state of the Union. The Wise family is not one to 
become extinct. 

J.\coB \\'iSE, a grandson of this Adam Wise, a son of John George 
Wise, became a citizen of this county in 1849. His father, John George 
Wise, died at his home in Winfield township in 1859. John George was 
born in 1786. He had six sons. Jacob Wise, the Lake county settler, was 
born January 20, 1817. In his Winfield home he was a farmer, a larick- 
maker, a teacher of vocal music, a township Trustee, a very useful, upright, 
valuable citizen. He spent his last years as a retired farmer in Crown Point, 
he and his wife both interested in the Association of Old Settlers, in the meet- 
ings of the North Street Baptist church, near which church building was his 
home, and in the general good of society. He died November 9, 1895, about 
eighty years of age, and his wife died in March, 1904, a very kindly, noble 
woman. ]\Iany children and grandchildren are living. 

Fuller. — Another large family must have some mention here. James 
Fuller, with more means than many of the early settlers had, came to the 
county about 1840. He had nine sons and one rlaughter, perhaps more than 
one. The daughter was married to Abram Nichols. 



126 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Names of sons and numljer of tlieir children : — Oliver Fuller, four sons 
four daughters. James Fuller, one son. Aaron Fuller, six children. Archi- 
bald Fuller, four sons and four daughters. Frank Fuller, two sons and seven 
daughters. Benjamin Fuller, one son and two daughters. Richard Fuller, 
five sons and six daughters, ^^'oodbury Fuller, two sons. John 'SI. Fuller, 
five sons and three daughters. In all fifty-six. 

Three of the nine sons named above are now living in the county. How 
manv descendants there are now of James Fuller of 1840 has not been reck- 
oned up. The great-grandchildren would make of themselves alone quite a 

group. 

Brief Records. 

The following are names of worthy citizens who did their parts well in 
making Lake county what now it is. but of whom there is very little to place 
on this page as memorials. The first one to be named might have well said, 
in the words of Dr. Bonar's "Everlasting Memorial," a ^■ery different poem 
from Tennyson's "In Memoriam" : 

"So let my living be. so be my dying: 
So let my name lie. unblazoned unknown : 
Lnpraised and unmissed, I shall still be remembered. 
Yes — but remembered by what I have done.'" 

Augustine Humphrey settled on Eagle Creek Prairie, now Palmer, as 
earlv as 1837, probably in 1836. He was from New England, he and his 
wife both devoted and very useful members of the Presbyterian church, his 
children intellectual and well brought up. his oldest son. Henry Humphrey, 
graduating at the University of Michigan in 185 1, and at Princeton Theo- 
logical Seminarv in i860, but dying in a few years, other sons following soon 
to the unseen world, and then the noble. Christian mother, and, except one 
daughter-in-law, he was left before many years quite alone in life. He was 
county Commissioner in 1847 ^"^ ^S^'^^^ i" i^S^- His family genealogic rec- 
ord went back to the Norman Conquest, through, according to the family 
tradition, the old Duke Horton of England, but no copy of it was brought to 
this countv. He died many years ago, the last of his household except the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 127 

daughler-in-law's family who remo\ed to Colorado, and the burial of his body 
was one of the most lonely burials ever in this county. In that world, where 
such a spirit as his would go, there is no lack of life and love. 

Another of these names is John L. \\'orley, born in Indiana April 28, 
1820, settling in Lake county in 1839. President for nine years of the Lake 
County Sabbath School Convention, residing south of Lowell, an active church 
member, who lived to be over eighty years of age. 

Another name is that of William Sanders, of West Creek township, 
whose name was given to one of the cemeteries of that township, the oldest 
member of the Association of Old Settlers, who died October 16, 1898, nearly 
ninety-seven years of age. 

And yet another name is Hir.\m H. Scritch field, another settler from 
the State of Kentucky probably, as his wife was born near Lexington. Ken- 
tucky, January 4, 1812, and he was born in 181 1. They were married in 
1832. and were the parents of fourteen children. A few years ago their 
living descendants numbered eighty-two, and would now quite certainly 
number more than a hundred. 

The last name in this group is that of David !McKnight. He was the 
father of six sons and three daughters. His first settlement was at Hickon.- 
Point in 1845. About 1864 the family removed to the neighborhood of 
LeRoy. Four of the sons went into the L'nion Army and two of them re- 
turned. The father went to the ^^'est some years ago and there died. The 
family in church relations were what is now called Reformed Presbyterians, 
valuable members of any community. A son, a daughter, and grandchildren 
are still in the county working on the side of virtue and righteousness. 

That some other names might have proi^erly been placed upon this list is 
certain. There are limitations to all human efforts. There are phvsical im- 
possibilities, mental impossibilities, and moral impossibilities, and to reach 
perfection in this line of writing may well he called a mental impossibility. 
Xo one could give of our most worthy early settlers a perfect list. Some names 
are added here of those whom a few mav vet remember. Daniel ]\Iav, Peleg 



128 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

S. Mason. William Hodson, Robert Wilkinson, of Deep River. James West- 
brook, Jonathan Brown, Royal Benton, Edmund Brown, Jabez Rhoades, David 
Gibson, Jacob Mendenhall, S. J. Cady, Horace Wood, John Russell, Peyton 
Russell, William Myrick, Jesse Pierce, David Pierce, these last two, accord- 
ing to the Claim Register in December, 1834, and in 1836, Jacob Van Volken- 
burg, John J. Van Volkenburg, and M. Pierce, from the State of New York. 
Lorenzo D. Holmes became a resident about 1838 and died at Ross in 1883. 

Buildings as well as men disappear. About this time three old landmarks 
in Crown Point were removed. The first Methodist church building was 
taken down in the fall of 1882. It stood on East street. The Crown Point 
bakery was taken down in July, 1883. The first Baptist church building, 
which was also on East street, was taken down in August, 1883. 

And so with these twenty-one added names and the mention of three 
old buildings this memorial chapter ends. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 129 



CHAPTER IV. 

Names of Women of Whom Honorable Mention Should Be Made. 

Note. — In presenting and recording under this heading tlie names of 
quite a numbei" of pioneer women, and appending, as I propose to do, to 
some of them special statements, I am well aware that some fault may be 
found with this otherwise interesting and important chapter. For I expect 
that some one will say, after looking over all these names, "The name of 
my mother (or grandmother) is not here, and she too was entitled to an 
honorable mention. Why is not her name on this list?" I have considered 
this criticism, this question, and have endeavored to weigh it well. Of 
course my reply to the question would be. Because the name of that mother 
or that grandmother was not in the range of my knowledge, or did not 
come to mind in my efiort to recall the names of our pioneers : certainly 
not because it was intentionally omitted. So^ now I ask myself ; Shall I 
omit entirely this list of names of so many of our noble mothers and grand- 
mothers because I cannot make it a full and perfect list? And I answer. 
No. I will get what help I can; I will do the best I can; (surely no one 
without the personal knowledge which I possess could begin to do as well 
as this will be done) ; and then I will trust to the good sense of our citizens, 
trusting that very little fault will he found. T. H. B. 



Mrs. Harriet Warner Holton is the first name recorded here. She 
came into the county in February, 1835, with her son W. A. W. Holton, 
a daughter, and with William Clark and family, from Jennings county, 
Indiana. She was born in Hard wick, Massachusetts, Januarv 15, 1783, a 
daughter of General ^\'arner. She commenced her active life as a teacher in 
the town of Westminster. She married a young lawyer, Alexander Holton, 
about 180^, and leaving New England in 1816 for what then were true 
Western wilds, in March, 18 17, they settled at Vevay in the new State 
of Indiana, four years after Vevay had been laid out as a town. In 1820 
the Holton family removed to Vernon, in Jennings county, where Mrs. Hol- 
ton again became a teacher. In 1823 her husband died leaving her with two 
sons and one daughter. In the early winter of 1834 tidings came to Vernon 



130 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

from Solon Robinson concerning the beautiful prairie region he had found 
far up in the northwest corner of the State, and the Clark and Holton 
families determined to join him there. They started in midwinter with 
ox teams. The weather in February, 1835, was severely cold, but they 
came through, crossing the Kankakee Marsh with their ox teams on the ice. 

In some respects Mrs. Holton was the most remarkable woman ever 
in Lake county. She was Lake county's first teacher. Her mother lived 
to be about ninety-four years of age. She had seven sisters in New England 
and all died of old age, two while sitting in their chairs. All the eight were 
members of the Presbyterian church. Mrs. Holton, a true Indiana pioneer, 
at Vevay and Vernon and in the county of Lake, lived on, active in church 
and Sunday-school and social life till old age came upon her. She died 
October 17, 1879, then nearly ninet}'-se\'en years of age. From a record in 
"The Sunday Schools of Lake" the following" sentence is taken: "Such a 
woman, in such a long life, the daughter of an army leader, with her native 
intelligence, her New England training, her granite-like, Presbyterian prin- 
ciple, her de\-otion. her meekness, her love, must in various ways have ac- 
complished no little good." 

Tlie second name to be placed on this list is that of Mrs. Maria Rob- 
inson, wife of Solon Robinson, the first white woman to live where is now 
Crown Point. She came to the spring that was, to the grove or woodland 
that still is, the last day of October, 1834. She was born November 16, 
1799, near Philadelphia. She was married in Cincinnati, May 12. 1828, 
to Solon Robinson, and in a few years they became residents in Jennings 
county, Indiana. In 1834 she came with her husband, one assistant, and 
two small children, in a wagon drawn by oxen, to the spot where they settled 
November i, 1834. She was not an ordinary woman, although very differ- 
ent in training and character from Mrs. Holton. She had much "executive 
ability;" she is described by one who knew her well as "always cheerful and 
vivacious," attending to the needs of the sick and the poor, aiding, as her 
means permitted, churches and Sunday schools and benevolent organizations. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 131 

Slie died February i8, 1872. Two daughters are now living, one of whom, 
Dr. L. G. Bedell, is now a noted physician of Chicago. Her older daughter, 
Mrs. Strait, who has children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, now 
lives in Crown Point, the oldest resident and only original resident of the 
town. 

Two names should follow here on this list of worthy pioneer women, 
but of whom little by this writer is known, Mrs. Chiklers, the wife of 
Thomas Childers, the first white woman, so far as known, after Mrs. Will- 
iam Ross, to set'tle in the county, and Mrs. Clark, wife of Judge William 
Clark, who came to Lake Court House in February, 1835, which was then 
known, as the guide boards on the trails testified, simply as Solon Robin- 
son's. Mrs. Clark had sons in her household, two of whom, Thomas Clark 
and Alexander Clark, were for many years active citizens in Lake county. 

Other active pioneer women whose names belong on this page were 
Mrs. Henry Wells, the mother of Mrs. Susan Clark, of Rodman \Ye\\s and 
Homer Wells; Mrs. Richard Fancher, one of the first Presbyterian women 
in Crown Point, the mother of Mrs. Nicholson, Mrs. Clingan, and Mrs. 
Harry Church, and the mother who brought up such daughters certainly 
deserves to be remembered ; Mrs. Russel Eddy, who became a very active 
Presbyterian woman, a leader for many years in that church; Mrs. Luman 
A. Fowler, one of the few resolute pioneer women, who came as a young 
wife in December of 1835 to Solon Robinson's hamlet, born in Madison 
county. New York, in October, 1816, married October 18, 1835, her maiden 
name Eliza Cochran, and who, as mother and grandmother led in Crown 
Point a long and useful life: and one more name, that of Mrs. Henry 
Farmer, coming with her husband from Bartholomew county in 1836, whose 
daughters became wives of well known citizens, completes this group. To 
nearly all the women yet named Crown Point as now it is owes very much. 

Another group of our noble pioneer women, of whom Lake county 
had a goodly number (and few of their names have ever until now been 
on a printed page), were these, not grouped in alphal^etical order, but as 



132 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

they are associated in the mind of the writer : Mrs. Richard Church, Airs. 
Leonard Cntler. jNIrs. Rockwell, I\Irs. Darling Church, mother of Edwin 
Church, a grocer for many years at Crown Point. Airs. Bothwell, Mrs. 
Owens, Airs. Benjamin Farley, Mrs. N. Hayden, an active Sunday-school 
woman in the \\ est Creek neighborhood, active also in the same work. Airs. 
Spalding, mother of J. P. Spalding, Airs. Fisher, and Airs. Cooper Brooks; 
also in the same neighborhood, Airs. Peter Hathaway, the mother of Silas, 
Abram, and Bethuel Hathaway, Airs. Lyman Foster, Airs. Jackson; in an- 
other neighborhood. Airs. Fuller, mother of Airs. Alarvin, Airs. Blayney, 
Airs. Graves, all interested in Sunday-school and church work, also Airs. 
Gordinier, who with only one hand accomplished the work done by ordinary 
women with two hands. Airs. George A\'illey, mother of Airs. J. Fisher, of 
Crown Point, Airs. James Farwell, the first white woman known to have 
set foot on tlie site of Crown Point, who with her family camped there 
July 4, 1833, a more than ordinary woman from Vermont, the mother of 
six sons and one daughter, that daughter becoming the wife of Thomas 
Clark and the mother of Airs. Oliver Wheeler, the grandmother of Aliss 
Alay Brown, of Crown Point; Airs. Alercy Perry, mother of the first Airs. 
Alarvin, and Airs. Solomon Burns. East of there was a small group of 
1837 and 1838. the first Airs. Henry Sasse, Airs. Herlitz, Airs. \'an Hollen, 
these by birth Germans and Lutheran by training, and Airs. Jane A. H. 
Ball. Airs. Ball was from Alassachusetts, the only daughter of Dr. Timothy 
Horton of West Springfield, had been educated in the best schools of Hart- 
ford, Connecticut, and began as early as 1838 to teach in the small neigh- 
borhood, pu]3ils coming from Prairie ^^"est, three miles away. As early 
as 1840 she commenced a boarding and academic school, the first in the 
countv, which continued in some form for many years. She had brought 
from her father's home c^uite a chest i)f medicines and some surgical instru- 
ments, which she thought would be needed, and she soon became, not in 
name, but in fact, the physician and dentist of the neighborhood, her den- 
tistrv, however, extending no further than extracting and cleaning teeth. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 133 

For extracting teetli and fur medicine she took some pny. iuit not any for 
her time, and she was called from home sometimes in the night as well as 
in the day. Besides being the first academic teacher, she also was the first 
who might be called a woman pliysician of the county. Her own se\-en 
children were all educated and two sons and one daughter yet li\-e to cher- 
ish her memory. 

In another group are placed the following names : ■Mrs. John \\'ood, 
also from Massachusetts, a cousin of the noted missionary, Mrs. Sarah B. 
Judson, born October 13, 1802. married November 16. 1824, the mother 
of eight children, the oldest of whom, Nathan Wood, is yet living at W'ood- 
\-ale. and dying September 2~, 1873. A fine granite monument, about fifteen 
feet in height, marks the burial place, on which is inscribed, "A true, faith- 
ful, loving wife; a kind and affectionate mother; e\'er toiling for the good 
of all; and this is her memorial." Mrs. Wood was another of those superior 
New England women, like Mrs. Holton and Mrs. Farwell of A'ermont, and 
others who are yet to be named, with native endowments and a Puritanic 
training, which fit their possessors so well for frontier life and for laving 
the right foundations for an enduring civilization. The comfort and hos- 
pitality of her home were not excelled by any in those early rears. She 
was one of oiu^ unselfish women, and well does her memorial say. "toiling 
for the good of all." 

In this group, though li\-ing in another part of the county, mav be 
fittingly named ^Mrs. Augustine Humphrey, one of the ver)- earlv residents 
on Eagle Creek Prairie, now called Palmer. She was also from New 
England and besides caring for her children and attending to home duties 
she was much interested in church work, a devoted Presbyterian woman. 

j\lrs. Woodbridge was yet another of these well trained New England- 
ers, an early resident also at Palmer, the wife of Rev. George A. Wood- 
bridge, and near neighbor to Mrs. Humphrey, the two families being con- 
nected by ties of kindred as well as by a common religious faith. At their 
iiomes was Presbyterian preaciiing by Rev. J. C. Brown an.d \w Rev. W. 



134 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Townley. After some years the Woodbridge family removed to Ross and 
here Mrs. Woodbridge became the Superintendent of the Sunday school. 
An active, truly noble, intelligent. Christian woman, she spent part of her 
later vears of life, sometimes with her son at Ross, sometimes in Joliet. She 
lived on, a pleasant and peaceful life allotted to her, until August, 1902, 
having reached eighty-eight years of age. 

The name of Mrs. Nancy Agnew may be placed by itself here as be- 
longing to a resolute, earnest woman. A sister of those Bryants who found, 
and bore Isack to her m Porter county for burial, the body of her husband 
who perished from exhaustion and exposure in the stormy night hours of 
April 4, 1835, she did not yield to her bitter trial, but soon came herself to 
the new settlement, and on the settler Register for that year stands among 
the claimants the name Nancy Agnew, widow. To her son, born not long 
after her husband's death, she gave his father's name, David Agnew. 

Mrs. Margaret Fearce, who was Margaret Jane Dinwiddle, sister of 
T. W. Dinwiddle, of Plum Grove, manifested some of her heroic equalities 
in her girlhood in her experiences with the Indians, then living near her 
cabin home. Two of the young Indians about her own age were sometimes 
quite annoying. One day, seizing an opportunity to frighten her at least, 
they sprang up and threatened her with their tomahawks. Instead of cry- 
ing out, as they perhaps expected, or turning pale with fright, she simply 
stood still and laughed at them. Asliamed, it may be they became, at the 
idea of injuring that bold, defenseless, laughing white girl, and let her 
pass on unharmed. Well they knew that a blow inflicted upon her would 
bring upon themselves sw'ift punishment. She was married in 1840 to 
Michael Pearce, and was the mother of ten children. She was born June 
5, 1818, and died in 1S94. She was a w'orthy member of the United Pres- 
byterian churcii, and exemplified many excellent qualities besides courage 
ni her long home life in Eagle Creek township. A good likeness of this 
excellent woman, who was of Scotch-Irish descent, is to be found in the 
Dinwiddle Clan Records. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 3 35 

The name of Mrs. Margaret Jeanette Dinwiddle comes next on this 
page. A member of the Perkins family, she was Ijorn near Rome, New 
York, May 5. 1818, was married to J. W. Dinwiddie August 19, 1844, and 
died March 15, 1888. She was one of the true an'd successful Sunday- 
school workers of the county. Educated at Rome, New York, accustomed 
to teaching, an experienced teacher, for about twenty-five years she carried 
on with some others the Plum GroA-e school, herself generally the Super- 
intendent. To her more than to any other one woman in the county the 
County organization for twenty-five years was indebted for its success. She 
was a member of the first Baptist church in Lake county and a member of 
the North Street Baptist church m Crown Point at the time of her death. 
In the "Lake of the Red Cedars," and in the "Sunday Schools of Lake," 
may be found her memorials. 

Some names are agam grouped. Mrs. Sarah Beadle, Mrs. Sarah 
\\'ells, Mrs. Sarah Childers. these three Sarahs with their husbands and with 
J. L. Worley, were the constituent meml^ers of the first church in the county 
called "Christian" or Disciple church with no other designation. This 
church is located now at Lowell, where there are three Christian churches, 
one Roman Catholic, one Presbyterian, one Methodist. The Methodist pio- 
neer women were: Mrs. E. \V. Bryant, Mrs. Ephraim Cleveland, Mrs. 
Kitchel, Mrs. Taylor, mother of Mrs. S. G. Wood, Mrs. Wood, wife of Dr. 
James A. Wood, Mrs. Viant, women all of character and note. 

Other women among early and active and useful residents in the county 
were, Mrs. Wallace, born in Vermont, the mother of Mrs. W. Brown, of 
Crown Point, Mrs. Brown, of Southeast Grove, mother of John Brown 
and \\'. B. Brown, Mrs. Crawford, mother of Mrs. Matt. Brown, and Mrs. 
E. Hixon, Mrs. McCann, of Plum Grove, and ]\Irs. Hale, Mrs. E. M. Rob- 
ertson, mother of Airs. O. Dinwiddie, ]\Irs. "Ruth Barney, widow," whose 
name stands thus as a claimant on the Register for the year 1836, Mrs. Sig- 
ler, the mother (jf se\'eral sons, Mrs. Servis, mother of O. V. Servis, and 
Mrs. George Earle. Some of these women were Presbyterians, most of 
them in fact, Methodists and Baptists being also represented. 



136 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

There are yet other names. Mrs. Banks, two of whose sons are well 
known at Hobart and Crown Point ; Mrs. Sykes, mother of a large family 
of well known sons and daughters, a woman who has but lately gone from 
among the living, having spent in this county a large part of a long, active, 
and useful life, and who like the other women named has left her impress 
upon this generation; Mrs. Rhodes, wife of Jonas Rhodes, whose daughters 
are active women now ; Mrs. Abraham Muzzall : Mrs. Henry Hayward, 
younger than some of the others: Mrs. Bartlett ^^'oods; ]\Irs. Kenney and 
Mrs. Woodruff, of Orchard Grove ; some from New England, some from 
Old England; and Mrs. ^^'inslow. mother of A. A. \Vinslow, Consul to 
Guatemala. JNTrs. J. C. Kinyon and Mrs. Henry Sanger both died in 1881. 

There are yet other names. Five earnest Christian women of West 
Creek township for a time, who did much to make the central part of Lake 
Prairie, that gem of the prairie region, "bud and blossom like the rose," 
were Mrs. M. L. Barber, spending her latest years in Kansas, her sister, 
Mrs. Burhans, who closed her life in Hammond, Mrs. Little, mother of 
Hon. Joseph A. Little, and ]Mrs. Gerrish, and Mrs. ^^'ason; the last three 
from the Granite State, and all five with granite-like principle. 

A little group comes in here now of women of foreign birth, who had 
crossed the broad Atlantic, who had much tn learn in regard to language 
and institutions, but whose well trained children proved them to be true 
mothers, known years ago among us as Mrs. John Hack, Mrs. Giesen, Mrs. 
Dasclier, Mrs Beckley. Mrs. Hack, so far as known, was the first German 
woman to find a home in the county. The sturdy sons and tall husband that 
came with her are gone, Ijut grandchildren and great-grandchildren live at 
Crown Point. Mrs. Gcisen is represented at Crown Point by two furniture 
dealers and undertakers, son and grandson. Mrs. Dascher came from the 
old country with a cluster of blooming, well trained girls around her, and 
one son. Her descendants yet live among us. and some of them are bloom- 
ing girls now. Inulding into womanhood. The descendants of Mrs. Beckley, 
that fervent, sensible, courteous, German Methodist woman, are somewhere 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 137 

in the world, li\-ing in a way, it is to be hoped, to do lier memory honor. 

Here are the names of a very different group: Mrs. CaHsta Sherman, 
born in \'ermont, dying in Crown Point when more than ninety-five years 
of age, one of our oldest women, who shared largely in the respect and 
esteem of the community; and connected with her may be named two 
daughters, Mrs. Farrington and Mrs. J. H. Luther. It is recorded of Mrs. 
Luther, who had no children of her own, that she was "a mother to some 
motherless girls, and one of our noblest women in relieving suffering hu- 
manity, in avoiding injurious gossip, in kindly deeds of friendship and 
neighborly regard." The next in this group is the name of Mrs. Rosalinda 
Helton, a sister of Mrs. Sherman, the youngest of thirteen children of the 
Smith family of Friends of Shrewsbury, Vermont, born July i8, 1795, dying 
in Crown Point when nearly eighty-nine years of age, at the home of Mrs. 
R. C. Young, where she had resided for many years. Next to her name 
belongs the name of her daughter, Mrs. R. Calista Young, mother of Charles 
H. Young, of Chicago, who has herself closed up a life not short, a life 
marked by large unselfishness, by untiring efforts for the good of those con- 
nected with Jier, by a steadfast Christian faith and hope. Five such women 
are not found in e\'ery community as were tliese twO' aged sisters and their 
daughters. 

Other names : Mrs. Vinnedge, head of a large family, a Methodist 
when sixteen years of age, an earnest church member through a long life; 
Mrs. Frank Fuller ( Haimah Ferguson), mother of nine children; Mrs. 
Sarah R. Brown, who became the second wife of Amos Hornor; Mrs. 
Mary M. Mason, daughter of Henry Farmer, becoming a resident in 1836, 
second wife of Deacon Cyrus M. Mason; Mrs. Martin Vincent (Mercy 
Pierce), married in 1837, the head of a well-known family, that is, the 
womanly head, the mother; i\Irs. William Belshaw, born in 1824. a mem- 
ber of the Jones family, and who, then Miss Jones, was a teacher in two 
of the early log schoolhouses, one near Lowell, one near Pine Grove; Mrs. 
Lucy Taylor, wife of Adonijah Taylor, born in Connecticut, bnuight up in 



138 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Vermont, born in 1792, the mother of nine children, dying in 1869. '"a liighly 
respected and estimable Christian woman" ; Mrs. Ebenezer Saxton of Wig- 
gins Point and Merrillville. a woman who had a fearful experience with a 
drunken Indian in the absence of her husband, the Indian, surly and cross, 
threatening the death of an infant in the cradle, she at length, when the In- 
dian slept, pouring out the remainder of the whiskey from his jug, watching 
the children through that long night, relieved at last of the presence of 
the Indian hy Dr. Palmer, who came along some time in the morning of 
the next day. The girls and the mothers of that day had fortitude and 
courage. 

.\ few more names, for this is a grand list, including the names of many 
who were among the excellent of the earth. Mrs. ]\IcCarty, wife of Judge 
Benjamin ^^IcCarty. the mother of six sons and two daughters, was not only 
an early settler in Lake county but in Porter and La Porte, having a home 
in the latter county in 1832, 1833, and 1834. She was not young when 
coming into Lake county, some of her sons were young men, her daughters 
were young women, intelligent and cultivated all. and at Creston, in a 
little pri\-ate cemetery her dust reposes. 

Mrs. Bclshaw. an English Baptist, a mother of sons and daughters, also 
came from La Porte county, in middle age, to become an early resident in 
Lake. Hers was for a time a bright home. But death came, and her young 
daughter, eighteen years of age, was taken away from earth, and she with 
many of the large family found another home in the then distant Oregon, 
where one of her sons, who had married Candace McCarty, became a noted 
wheat raiser in that great wheat state. Other members of the Belshaw 
family yet remain in Lake county, and her name belongs of right among 
our worthy mothers and grandmothers. 

In a different part of the county, in the woodland north of Hanover 
Center, where was a great resort for deer, was the first home of another 
worthy woman, a Presbyterian churcl: member, Mrs. Hackley. She was the 
mother of Mrs. W. A. Clark and Mrs. Pettibone, of Crown Point, and at 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 139 

length she and her hushand had their residence at Crown Point with Mrs. 
Clark. 

Other names are: Mrs. Robbins. of Brunswick and Lowell, both of 
whose sons fell as members of the Union Army; ^Slrs. Dudley Merrill, of 
Merrillville: ^Irs. Krost, of Crown Point, the mother of four sons and two 
daughters: Mrs. Sohl, of Hammond, an early resident in the old North 
township, before Hammontl was: ]\Irs. Payne, Mrs. Foley, Mrs. Stringham, 
the earliest residents on Center Prairie, who did not long remain, but who 
helped to start civilization before their husbands removed : IMrs. Jones, a 
later resident than they, mother of Perry Jones, born in October, 1804, who 
lived among us to be almost ninety-six years old. One of our very aged 
women. "She retained her faculties well, enjoyed reading, and in her re- 
lations in life was an estimable woman." 

Mrs. Allman, the wife of Rev. AL Allman, spending many useful years 
in Crown Point, closed her days in Michigan. 

Mrs. Mary Hill, mother of Dr. Hill, of Creston, and of Jvlrs. Henry 
Surprise, a motherly woman indeed, of rare patience and untiring love, lived 
to complete eighty-four years of life. 

]\Irs. Gibson, an early resident of the old North township of the county, 
closed her life in Chicago, eighty-seven years of age. 

The name of Underwood is prominent in Lake county and Mrs. LTnder- 

wood's name must be recorded here. She was the mother of five daughters, 

three of whom are yet living; Mrs. Harper and j\Irs. Joy, of Hobart, and 

Mrs. Palmer, of Hebron. She was also the mother of several sons, of whom 

one is living east of Merrillville. She died many years ago at the home of 

her daughter. Airs. Palmer, wife of Dr. Palmer, and was over ninety years 

of age. 

Three Later Residents, Not Pioneers. 

-Another of our excellent women was Mrs. Reuben Fancher, who was in 

girlhood and young womanhood Mary Elizabeth Hawkins. She was born 

in Genoa, Cayuga county. New York, March 4, 1835. She was baptized 



140 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

February 17, 1856. and became a member of the ^Methodist Episcopal church 
September 28, 1856. She spent several years of hfe in Buffalo, and was 
active there in Sunday-school work, ha\-ing charge of a mission class num- 
bering from fifty to one hundred members, which she taught for several 
years, thus gaining much experience in that grand work. 

August 17-, 1859, she was married in Buffalo to Reuben Fancher, and 
they soon after came as permanent residents to Lake county. Lidiana. She 
became before long a teacher in the Methodist Sunday-school, and her Chris- 
tian character and rich experience in that work made her a very valuable 
teacher to whom that school is largely indebted for the good done in the 
past. She was in Buffalo and Crown Point engaged in that work for about 
tw'enty-five years. She kept a diary as some others in the county have done. 
January 11, 1897, when nearly sixty-two years of age, she passed from 
earth, leaving two daughters to follow in her footsteps and do good. 

The following is one of the resolutions adopted by Lake Lodge, of 
which her husband and son were members : "Resolved, That by her death 
Crown Point has been deprived of a highly respected Christian woman, 
whose character was beautiful, sincere, and pure, and whose home influence 
merited the emulation of all." Signed, James C. Gibbs, Edward A. Krost, 
Herman J. Lehman, Committee. 

Mrs. Lydia F. Flint, a member in girlhood of the large Smith family, 
w^as born July 16, 1825, in Franklin county. New York. She was married 
in Delaware county. Ohio, August 5, 1846, to William Flint. A son, 
James, was born December 15, 1847. In the fall of 1859 the family came 
into Lake count\-, Indiana, where in 1862 her husband and son both died, 
leaving her a chiklless widow. She died I\Iay 22, 1903, having had a home 
for thirtv years with her sister. ]\Irs. C. X. Morton. \\"ith no descendants 
to perpetuate her name and cherish her memory, as a good and true Chris- 
tian woman, her name deserves a place among our honored women. 

A third one of these later residents was ]\Irs. Hart, wife of A. X. Hart, 
of Dver. mother of ]Malcolm and Milton Hart and ^Nlrs. Biggs, of 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 141 

Crown Point, the family coming from Philadelphia about 1855. and settling 
on the State Line at Dyer, while that part of the county was still quite new 
and wild. ]Mrs. Hart was not a frontier woman. Accustomed to the life 
of a city, she was retiring in her habits, and did not feel the necessity that 
women who had very young children did feel to enter \-ery actively into 
the work of building up society around her. To her three sons and one 
daughter she gave much care, and to her diligent training they were much 
indebted. She had a strc^ng nati\-e sense of justice, wishing to see all per- 
sons treated justly, without partiality. She loved beauty, and, brought up 
as she had been, she prized the true refinements of life. 

She spent the later years of her life at Crown Point, where she had an 
elegant residence built to suit her taste for beauty in architecture, now the 
residence of ]\Irs. jMalcolm Hart. While not so widely known as were many 
other mothers the name of INIrs. A. X. Hart (one sun and her one daughter, 
Mrs. F. X. Biggs, and some intimate friends yet living to cherish her 
memory) will stand here to represent a very cultivated, refined, and worthy 

woman. 

".Aunt Susan."' 

The next name to be recorded here is the name of a verv motherly 
woman, who was not herself a mother, who was never married, but of whom, 
as doing a mother's part, it may truthfully be said, that many would rise 
up to do her honor. Susan Patterson Turner was born in Pennsylvania, 
February 27, 18 13. Her father's family were genuine pioneers. As the 
oldest child and the only daughter of the family of Samuel Turner of Eagle 
Creek, she was left in charge of the household through the winter of 1838, 
while the father and mother returned to La Porte county to find a more com- 
fortable winter abode. She and her l^rothers passed safely and well through 
the privations of that winter; and when, in 1871, her aged mother died, the 
care of the household, in which she as an only daughter had large experience, 
devolved very fully upon her. To her brothers' children, who delighted to 
visit the old homestead, she was Aunt Susan, and as vears came on, and her 



142 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

motherly capabilities and excellent qualities continued to be brought out 
she was known as "Aunt Susan" by a large community who highly appre- 
ciated her nobility of character. She died Juh" 24. 1899. 

Mrs. Higgins. coming into Lake county as DiaiTtha Tremper in 1844, 
was born near Niagara Falls in 1824. She became well accjuainted witli 
the families of the early settlers in both Lake and Porter counties. In 1847 
she was married to Dr. J. Higgins. who in 1859 settled as a physician in 
Crown Point. In the earlier years of her life in Crown Point she was an 
active woman in the life around her. She trained up carefully her only 
child, now Mrs. Youche. and her one grandson, but in later years impaired 
health kept her more closely in her home. As a Christian woman her 
examples and influence were for good on those around her. She died in 
1895. In a printed memorial of her it was said : "A woman broad-minded, 
not taking narrow views in the great interests of humanity, cherishing 
warmly the domestic virtues, she will have a right to be remembered as one 
of those connected with our many pioneer women who have finished up their 
threescore years and ten of life, and have passed on before to the rest 
and the activities of the unseen world." 

And here may be added the names of faithful mothers who have lately 
passed from among us, Mrs. Jacob \\'ise and Mrs. Seymour Patton, both 
quite aged women, faithful to duties in their generation, lx)th members of 
well known and substantial families. Grouped with these also may be th.e 
name of Mrs. James Patton, of Winfield, the mother of Mrs. Vansciver, of 
Crown Point. 

Mothers of Many Children. 
Among the mothers of large Lake county families must be placed, first, 
the name of Mrs. Flint, of Southeast Grove. Among the first settlers of 
that beautiful Grove were the members of this noted Methodist family. One 
daugliter was the first wife of James H. Luther, one became the wife of 
Rev. D. Crumpacker, and one, the eighth child, Olive L., was the v ife of 
Rev. Robert Hyde. There were, in all, fifteen children, and Mrs. Hyde en- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. Ii3 

joyed the distinction of having seven brothers and sisters older and seven 
younger tlian herself. Airs. Hyde died in Chicago, September 3. 1901, 
about seventv-five years of age. Of her mother, )*Irs. Flint, not much is 
now known, but it is enough for this record that she brought up so large 
a family on firm religious principles, fitting them for stations of usefulness 
and honor. 

As the second among these mothers may be placed the name of J\Trs. 
Scritchfield, of Creston, the mother of thirteen children, having very many 
giandchildren and great-grandchildren yet living. 

The third of these mothers is Mrs. Julius Demnion, in girlhood Xancy 
Wilcox, member of a pioneer family, married in 1850, the mother of six sons, 
and six daughters, and who in less than fifty years had sixty-one living 
grandchildren in Lake county. 

The attentive reader has noticed that many of the earlier mothers had 
from six to eight or ten children, and it was a pleasant thing to find in those 
cabin homes wide-awake boys, and cheerful, li\-ely girls. Each of those 
large homes was a little world of itself. Home then was more like the old 
patriarchal times than is much of what is called home life now. Some be- 
lieve it was richer, purer, better than now. 

A place must be found on this roll of honor for the name of Mrs. 
Samuel Turner, of Eagle Creek, who was Jane Dinwiddle, born January 19, 
1783, a woman of Scotch-Irish blood, of Scotch Presbyterian principle, who 
was married to Samuel Turner at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in February, 
1810, and with him came to a choice location on Eagle Creek, in Lake 
county, in 1838, becoming a permanent resident in 1839, then fifty-six years 
of age. Not many now live who knew her in the home circle, but her like- 
ness in the "Dinwiddle Clan Records" shows her to have been an estimable 
woman, and her grandchildren and great-grandchildren in Iowa and In- 
diana show that through her they inherited the blessing of having been "well 
born," a pri\ilege to which it has been saiil all children have a right. 

The very close observer may notice that the first woman whose name 



lU HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

is on this list was born January 15, 1783, and that tlie last one was born 
January 19, 1783, both born in the year that gave peace after the Ameri- 
can Revolution. They were our oldest pioneers. For the most part the 
women, as well as the men, who came to share privations here and lay 
foundations were rather young, or in the prime of life. 

It is claimed as a saying of Napoleon Bonaparte, that what France 
most needed was mothers. That the mothers have much to do with what 
the children are and what they became is a well accepted fact. Mothers 
that were mothers had homes in Lake county two generations ago. And the 
names of at least some of them have been placed upon these pages. 

They could make bread and butter and cheese : they could wash and 
iron ; they could sew and knit and spin wool into yarn, and some of them 
could weave that yarn into cloth ; they had spinning wheels and looms : they 
could mold and dip candles; they could cut out garments and make them 
up; they could keep domestics, girls and women to help them in their work, 
having no trouble in trying to reduce them to the position of "servants," 
for they gave them seats at the family table and places around the fireside, 
treating them as they would wish their own daughters to be treated; they 
were mothers indeed, and looked well after all the wants of their households, 
carrying out well in their living the instructions given to women, and imi- 
tating well the model placed before women, in the Bible. 

They were not what is called in this day "society women" ; they were 
not members of any Clubs or of Secret Orders; they knew nothing of mod- 
ern "functions." They made visits and had dinners together and some- 
times suppers ; they had apple-paring bees, and quilting bees, and donation 
parties; they had much social life, attending camp-meetings and associations 
and other religious meetings. They were largely keepers at home, yet 
were they sociable, friendly, hospitable. Such were our mothers and grand- 
mothers, the early settlers here sixty years ago. And when the time came 
for a thousand of the sons of Lake to go forth, from eighteen hundred homes, 
containing about nine thousand people, to join the mighty American Army 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 145 

in fighting for tlie lite of the nation, tliis thousand went from homes where 
there were mothers with loyal as well as loving hearts. 

Of our little army of noble pioneer women, probably three or four hun- 
dred in number, there are living descendants now in the county to carry out 
in the life of this generation the rich results of their influence and their 
virtues. 

I am not claiming for any of them, those named and those not named, 
great brilliancy of intellect, fascinating social endowments, or remarkable 
talents, but I do claim that so long as there is a county of Lake, so long 
the influence of our noble women will endure. 

That women have done a large work in the county in promoting educa- 
tion is beyond any question. A deep and lasting impression on education 
and literature, in this county and outside of its borders, was made by the 
scho<jl carried on for so many years by Mrs. J. A. H. Ball. And from the 
day that Miss Ursula Ann Jackson, of West Creek, commenced to teach a 
public school in Pleasant Grove the first Monday of May, 1838. until this 
present time, women, and even quite young girls, have done a large part 
of the teaching in the public schools. Rev. ]\Ir. Townley, who conducted a 
large school in Crown Point from about 1848 till 1856, speaking of his 
school which furnished many teachers for the public schools, stated in 
November, 1852, that he had had up to that time nearly five hundred scholars, 
and that not five young men had gone out as teachers. In later years teach- 
ers have received higher wages anil more young men have accordingly been 
willing to engage in teaching. The women in all these years have been 
prominent in church work, in temperance work, in mission work ; and when 
the time came in 1861 and in the following years to provide relief and com- 
forts for sick and suffering soldiers, then the homekeeping women imme- 
diately formed aid societies and sent relief to the hospitals and camps. Two 
of their number, of pioneer families, Mrs. Sarah Robinson and Miss Eliza- 
beth Hodson, went forth from their homes in Lake to the hospitals at Mem- 
phis, and there helped to care for the sick, the wounded, the dying. It is 
10 



140 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

no more than justice, it is not courtesy, that the names, the deeds, the 
memorials, of our pioneer women should find some room and place along 
with the memorials of their husbands and their sons. 

Lake county has been represented by one Christian missionary in dis- 
tant Lidia. Mrs. Annie Morgan, a daughter of Judge Turner of Crown 
Point, a member in her childhood of the Crown Point Presbyterian Sunday 
school, becoming a Baptist and having been married to Rev. Freeman Mor- 
gan, a Baptist minister, left her native land with him in October, 1879, 
bound for Southei-n Asia, and there both entered upon mission work among 

the Telugus. 

Lake County Miscellany. 

By T. H. Ball. 

THE PIONEER CHILDREN AND NATURE. 

Each generation has, to some extent, privileges, opportunities, and ad- 
vantages, not b"'estowed, in the same degree, on other generations. 

In this short paper the writer proposes to notice the superior advantages 
which the pioneer children enjoyed in beholding natural beauty, and so, if 
their opportunities were improved, in securing the two great benefits to be 
deri\-ed from the cultivation of a love for nature, the refinement of the dis- 
position, and the increase of the means of happiness. 

That a true love for natural beauty, as seen on the earth and in the sky, 
is refining and mav increase largely life's enjoyment, will be taken at present 
as granted. The proofs, if needed, are to be found abundantly in human 
observation and experience. And so, realizing and recognizing that some 
beautiful landscape views may yet be seen in this county, especially in the 
southern townships, some beauties peculiar to the pioneer times will now be 
named. 

First of all among these were the wild prairies, the prairies with their 
native vegetation and their nati\e inhabitants. Before a furrow had been 
turned, a shrub or tree planted, a house or fence constructed, in the spring 
and early summer the carpet of green grass, with a few early flowers scattered 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. UT 

here and there, was charming to the eye : hut wlien the warm summer came, 
witli its ever glorious sunshine, and the polar plant, which the children called 
rosin-weed, attained the height of six or seven feet, the grass then thick 
and tall, the beds of phlox, as rich as in an Eastern garden, covering large 
areas, the meadow lilies open to the sunshine, the broad leaves of the prairie 
dock having attained full growth, and rich colored, true prairie flowers in 
great abundance, of many varieties, open on e\-ery side, — then vras the beauty 
of the prairie enchanting. There were no real weeds till man's plowshare 
turned over the prairie sod, and richer in color, greater in variety, more 
abundant even to profusion the flowers became as the summer approached the 
golden autumn. Then, as one would be riding on horseback amid the green 
verdure and tall polar plants, for roads and buggies were not ilien, and only 
a few venturesome children went out any distance on foot into the wilder- 
ness of beauty that lay in its bewildering extent of area before them : here 
and there would suddenly start up, as from under the very feet of the horse, 
the pinnated grouse, the chickens of the prairie, the true denizens of all this 
prairie region, and both horse and rider would be startled as one after another, 
in quick succession, from ten to twenty of those beautiful wild fowls would 
fly up on every side and sail away and soon sink down out of sight in that 
abundant verdure, amid which for many and many a summer their progenitors 
had been so secure. In that thick, rank, tall vegetation, no eye was likely to 
see them. 

Again, sometimes the rider would see not far away some of those other 
true tenants of the wilds, perhaps two or three prairie wolves, or one alone, 
seldom only one, on that apparently slow lope or gallop, which ne\-ertheless 
took them through the grass and over the flower beds quite rapidly, ami soon 
they too would be out of sight. Perhaps, again, the horseback rider would 
see, on some distant grass covered eminence, forty or more sandhill cranes 
going through some kind of evolution which the pioneers called a dance. 

None of these beautiful and entertaining sights which delighted the 
pioneer children can the children of this generation behold. All that rich 
beauty and wild life from our prairies has forever gone. 



14S HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Tlien there were other sights not peciiHar to the prairies, the bounding 
red-deer of the woodlands and the wild pigions in prodigious numbers, which 
the children of Lake can here never more see. Those pigeons, perhaps, gone 
forever from all our land, were, in form, in color, in motion, rich embodied 
beauty. The eyes of none of us will see those thousands of wild pigeons 
again as once they were in these woodlands, on our few grain fields, and some- 
times passing, by hundreds of thousands, in the sky above us. 

And yet again, the children of those days saw natural streams of water. 
Cedar Creek and Eagle Creek, winding amid their grassy banks along narrow 
valleys, were then beautiful streams. They ha\e been turned into ditches 
now. And so have West Creek and Turkey Creek, and other once pretty 
water courses, and who ever saw much beauty in a ditch ? Doubtless there 
are children in this county now who never saw one of those ever beautiful 
olijects in nature, a real, purling brook. And how can they appreciate such 
gems of poetry as this : "The noise as of a running brook in the leafy 
month of June, Which to the sleeping woods all night singeth a quiet 
tune." Instead of winding brooks, of which at Plum Grove a part of one 
is left, our water courses, like our roads and railroads, must now be made, 
as far as practicable, to go in straight lines. Utility takes the place of beauty. 

There is beauty yet left on the clouds, and on the morning and evening 
sky. but houses and barns and orchards and shade trees and shrubbery so 
obstruct the views that few children now observe or have a chance to see a 
fair, clear sunrise gilding the prairie and the woodlands with its rich hues 
of ruby or of gold: or those magnificent sunsets which some of us as children 
were jirivileged to enjoy, when huge masses of vapor like distant moun- 
tains seemed to be piled up in the west, and the setting sun. seeming to sink 
down into their fleecy folds, painted on them for a time golden, or purple, 
or crimson hues, or violet and ruby, the richest coloring, — unless some- 
times, once or twice in a lifetime the same may be seen at night on the 
northern sky, — that nature ever presents to our view. Such sunsets as were 
seen in this county in the years long past no artist can paint. Such coloring 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. Ii9 

man does not mix. But sometimes, with all the western horizon and blue sky 
cloudless, the sun would seem to touch the edge of the horizon, and on 
the line of prairie or behind a few trees, like a large red or golden globe of 
fire, almost too bright even then for the eye steadily to rest upon, would slowly 
yet soon disappear from sight, seeming to leave an open doorway into a world 
of dazzling glory. The rich Lieauty of pure, unstained light, could at such 
times be felt. 

And there was more, much more of animated nature full of beauty then, 
at which there is no time now to glance. The children of the pioneer days 
did see what our eyes never can behold. 

Even the prairie fires, too grand, too magnificent, and sometimes too de- 
structive, to give that sense of delight which beauty gives, were sometimes 
very pleasing to the eyes of childhood. Into the mouth of one of Ossian's 
heroes these words are put: "The columns of smoke pleased well mine eyes: 
I knew not then wherefore the maidens wept." And when there was no 
feeling of destruction children saw with delight the long lines of flame and 
the columns of smoke when after sweeping through the tall grass of the 
Kankakee Marsh the flames spread northward upon the prairie. 

Truly, the children of the pioneer years saw earth and sky with little 
to obstruct their range of vision. 

And this region was then, amid all its wild beauty a very fitting great 
temple in which to worship God. 

In these our days, much is said of art, something is taught of art. An 
e\-ening lecture was gi\en not long ago to the assembled teachers of Lake 
county and the subject was. Art in familiar things. And that was well. 
But who teaches the children to love natural beauty ? \\'ho teaches, "There's 
beauty all around our paths, if but our watchful eyes ccnild trace it mid 
familiar things, and through their lowly guise?" Who teaches the children 
now, as many pioneer children learned, amid the delightful opportunities 
and privileges which they enjoyed, to look through nature up to nature's 
God? To many of the pioneer children, in their great wilds of nature, before 



150 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tliere were cities or towns, or temples for worship as made with men's 
hands, God was very near. 

LANDSCAPES. 

I am unwilhng that this large volume of biographical sketches should 
go out among the later inhabitants of the county, (a county now containing 
a population of about forty thousand, many more than half of them residing 
in cities and towns or in villages), without some mention being made in 
it of our beautiful country views. And so in this chapter headed "Miscel- 
lany," is placed a paper concerning our landscapes. 

Webster gives as his first definition of the word landscape, "A portion 
of land or territory which the eye can comprehend in a single view, including 
all the objects it contains." Of course a prairie region, a moderately level 
region such as is Lake county, can have nothing of the grandeur of moun- 
tain scenery. The writer of this has stood on the summit of the New Hamp- 
shire IMount W'ashington ; has passed through Dixville Notch: has crossed 
the Cumberland and the Alleghany Mountains ; and he knows and admires 
mountain scenery. But he is sure there have been beautiful views in this 
sand ridge and woodland, prairie and marsh region of Lake. Some of 
these he will name. 

Near the village of Lake Station, from the top of a large sand hill, 
the northward view, on a clear summer afternoon, is full of interest to a 
lover of natural scenery. "The eye rests upon a part of the valley of Deep 
River; and just beyond is the village of Lake, surrounded by hills and woods, 
the fans for raising water reminding one of Don Quixote's windmills, and 
the vegetation gi^ ing evidence of the beds of sand from which it derives its 
nourishment." The railroad grounds in this village are large and neat, 
the finest in the county, and the distance is sufficient to give to the buildings 
a fine effect. 

From various hill tops in the north part of the county beautiful views 
could be enjoyed a few years ago, "the sweep of vision from these taking 
in a portion of Lake ^Michigan's blue waters, and the pines, and sand hills, 
and valleys of the shore. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 151 

Some very pretty \-ie\vs are foinid along a ridge of land which separates 
the Turkey Creek and Deep River localities and valleys, and especially near 
the once Red School-house or Vincent neighborhood. Looking northward 
one can see the woodland ridges which nui parallel with the Little Calu- 
met River, and southward and westward one can look over a broad area of 
undulating prairie, the first breadth of prairie upon wdiich Solon Robinson 
and his party looked, October 31, 1834, the emotions produced by which he 
called "indescribable." 

From this ridge also, looking across the prairie and Deep River valley, 
Crown Point presents, at the right time of day. a very pretty picture standing 
forth in the sunlight on its prairie eminences with the woodland height for a 
rich background. Another fine view of the town may also be obtained 
from an eminence near the eastern limit of the county, the distance being 
sufificient to give to the woodland on the west that beautiful hue of blue. 

The main prairie portion of Lake county is in two divisions. Tlie one 
south of Crown Point is Robinson Prairie ; the one in Hanover and West 
Creek townships is Lake Prairie. The small ones have borne the names 
of Eagle Creek, Bostwick, Prairie West, and Center. On Robinson Prairie, 
south of Crown Point, are eminences from which one can look over some 
miles of prairie, then across five or six miles of Kankakee valley land, once 
called marsh, and at length the vision ends along a line of blue which marks 
the course of the Ivankakee River, beyond which from no prairie height 
can the eye see over into Jasper and Newton counties, unless sometimes 
the steam from an engine may be seen far down on the JMonon Railroad. 

There is yet left a beautiful landscape which one beholds when coming 
northward from the Lowell and Hebron road, on the west side of the 
Eagle Creek valley, when emerging from the shrubbery and the grove, sud- 
denly there spreads out before one the prairie and valley courses of Deep 
River and Eagle Creek as once these were, and the village of Le Roy as 
now it is, and the open view far northward, once a green prairie in sum- 
mer, but now dotted over with fields, and houses, and barns, and orchards. 



152 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

But the landscape is beautiful still, and it comes so unexpectedl}- upon one 
who has not gone that way before. 

L.\KE PR.\IRIE VIEWS. 

Mrs. Nannie W. Ames, a daughter of Rev. H. Wason, of New Eng- 
land descent and training, a culti\ated woman, wrote the following at the 
time of Lake County's Semi-Centennial : 

"Lake Prairie has been called the 'Gem of the county,' and certainly 
it well deserves the fair name. Twenty-five years ago, Professor Mills, of 
Wabash College, stood on a knoll on Mr. Peach's farm, and looking around 
till his eye met the woods that encircle the gently rolling land, said : T 
have been thirty years in the \^'est and have been in every county in the 
State, and never but once have I seen so beautiful a view." Other strangers 
from the East, South, and \\'est have said the same thing." Mrs. Ames 
continues : "The scene has changed in this c|uarter of a century but has 
only gained in beauty. Now, as far as the eye can reach, may be seen com- 
fortable houses and farm buildings, orchards and shade trees, with here and 
there a bordering of deep green osage : while still farther in the distance the 
tall windmills point out the homes Ijeyond the range of vision." This writer 
may be more than commonly fond of the wildness of nature, and, perhaps, 
partial to Lake Prairie as once it was, and so he will only add here, that he 
prefers the beauty of sixty years ago, \^hich he knew so well, to the more 
improved beauty of the present. 

Also it may he added, that from other eminences, further north than 
the one mentioned by Mrs. Ames, some beautiful views may be obtained, the 
range of vision taking in all of that rich prairie, about ten miles from north 
to south, bounded on the west by the West Creek woodlands, by the Cedar 
Creek woods on the east, on the south, five miles beyond the prairie limit, 
extending over groves and marshland, reaching to the long line of blue that 
marks the course of the Kankakee River. 

LAKE COL'NTV CROW ROOSTS. 

The early settlers of Lake county. Indiana, found crows here, and they 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 153 

have been here ever since. They are probably more numerous now than 
they were in 1837. for they can now find a greater variety of food and they 
find it in greater abundance. The Indians no doubt helped them to some 
food, but the whites help them to nnich more. 

Among our black-birds there has been seen a real white one, a true 
Candida mcnila, but so far as known all our crows have been black, like those 
of whom that poem was written called "The Three Black Crows." The 
main roosting places of our crows in these latter years have been, in num- 
ber, two. One of these is nine miles northwest from Crown Point; the other 
is five miles south. 

The one south is in an evergreen grove which co\-ers an area of about 
four acres, set out for a wind-breaker in the center of the broad Robinson 
Prairie many years ago, the trees Scotch pine, Austrian pine, and some 
larch. This grove, the trees being very close together, makes a grand shelter 
for any of our birds, and the crows gather there at night by the hundreds, 
and have been estimated at fully one thousand. 

The roosting place, nortliwest of Crown Point, is by the side of the 
Pan Handle Railroad, on land formerly owned by ^Ir. A. N. Hart, who 
would not allow the first crows that came there to be disturbed. They sought 
near him a cjuiet resting place and they found it. He allowed no shooting 
near them. The tract of land came next into the possession of Mr. Malcolm 
T. Hart, one of the wealthy men of the county, and he followed his father's 
example, and the number of the trusting crows increased. 

That large estate is now in the hands of Mrs. M. T. Hart and her daugh- 
ter. Marguerite M. Hart, and they also are friendly toward the crows. Those 
that come here for night shelter and rest probably number thousands. They 
leave in the early morning, going westward and southward and return from 
their Illinois foraging grounds from sunset time till quite late in the evening. 
Ever since the raven went out from Noah's ark the black-feathered birds 
of the raven and crow kinds seem to have been successful in procuring food. 



154 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

AN OLD LANDMARK. 

As the month of October, 1902, was drawing to a close an old land- 
mark in Crown Point began to disappear. A building on Court Street, 
northwest of the northwest corner of the present public square, had been 
standing on that spot of ground beyond the reach of memory of most of 
the present inhabitants of the town. The oldest locust tree of the town stood 
in front of it. back of it was in 1834 an Indian garden spot, and near by was 
then a spring of water. There. October 31. 1834. Solon Robinson and 
family pitched their tent, the Robinson record says, "by the side of a spring." 

The next day, November i, 1834, work commenced with axes for erect- 
ing a log cabin, and in four days the family left the tent and moved into 
what they called their new house. New it certainly was, made of the logs 
of trees that were standing in that grove or woodland four days before. 
Additions to that first cabin were evidently made in 1835, but whether any 
portion of the log structure which was afterwards covered with siding and 
which had been on that spot, in 1902, more than sixty years, contained the 
first pile of logs is somewhat imcertain. Perhaps the south part of the entire 
structure, which was removed in November, 1902, to make room for a 
large livery barn, was the cabin of 1834, and, if so, had been standing for 
sixty-eight years. Of the part that for a time was left standing, a two- 
story building, the lower part of logs, the upper story of frame work, no one 
now living can tell when it was erected. Probably not, at least not com- 
pleted, till after the log court house was built in 1837, certainly not till after 
some sawed lumber could be obtained and nails came into use. In the con- 
struction of Lake county's first buildings no nails were used. 

Two only are living who were residents in Crown Point in 1837, and 
thev were then girls too young to know about the building of the Robinson 
home or the log court house. Three are yet living, who may have seen those 
buildings in 1837. ]\Ir. \\'illiam A. Taylor, 'Sir. Nathan Wood, and Mr. J- 
Kenney; and one other is living, the writer of this, who was in what is 
now Crown Point, five or six times in 1837. He probably knows as much 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 155 

about the buildings of that year as any one now Hving. But whenever 
built, this oldest house in Crown Point when 1902 closed, some part of 
the tenement as it was November 5. 1902. dating back to 1835. possibly to 
1834, it has an interesting history. And as the home of the founder of 
Crown Point that history should be preserved. 

At this home spot, quite certainly not inside of the log walls, was 
organized "The Squatters' Union of Lake County." the first action here of 
American citizens in exercising their right of governing themselves. Tlie 
record which is beyond ciuestion as to its accuracy says, this was done ''at a 
meeting of a majority of the citizens of Lake county held at the house of 
Solon Robinson on the fourth of July, 1836." The record says at the house, 
but it does not say in the house, and one who was present said the meeting 
was in the open air, in the grove. 

In 1837 this home was opened several times by its hospitable owners 
for religious worship, probably the first dwelling thus used in Crown Point, 
among the first thus used in all of Lake county. 

Th.is building was for many years the bright home of the Robinson 
family, where were born Dr. L. G. Bedell, now a noted physician of Chicago, 
and her brother Charles, and where with these an older brother and sister 
spent the sunny years of childhood and of youth ; and where sometimes 
for visiting, sometimes for dancing, would meet the youth and beauty of 
Crown Point. They who still dance among the young ladies of Crown 
Point (lance in larger rooms now and not on puncheon floors. 

Marriages and changes took place and the next of our historic families 
to make that house a bright living home was a member of the Holton family, 
Mrs. Calista Young, where her son Charles Young, now of Chicago, grew 
up to manhood: where, in 1884, her aged riiother died, and in the same 
year, after a residence in Crown Point of about five years, her mother's sis- 
ter's son, Air. Clement Brown: and where Solon Robinson, with his Florida 
wife, made a short sojourn on his last visit to Crown Point. 

After Mrs. Young went to Indianapolis to live with her son, then Deputy 



156 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Secretary of State, one more representative of one of our historic families 
found there a home. Mr. \\'illiam Clark, a grandson of judge \Mlliam 
Clark, the Clark family having been intimately associated with the Robinson 
family in the pioneer days. j\Irs. William Clark opened a millinery store in 
the log building, which was then becoming old. Some tenants occasionally 
occupied it afterwards. 

Tlius it has gone through its changes. An inviting home place for one 
connected family for more than half a century: at last furnishing an office 
room for ]\Ir. J- S. Holton in a part of the year 1902. Before that year 
closed the south part, the logs eighteen feet long (in one room of wdiich 
this writer, then a youth, remembers to have slept as one of the guests of 
the Robinson family), -was all removed, the north part, the logs also eighteen 
feet long, and apparently all solid, then left standing. 

One only is known to be living who was in the log cabin of 1834. and she 
was too young to know much difference between a cabin or a palace. 
It was enough for her that it was home. 

The next record for this page is : ^larch 2. 1903. Monday. To-day 
the remaining portion of the Robinson house was removed to make way 
for the printing office soon to be erected on this spot by J. J. Wheeler, whose 
wife is a granddaughter of the old log house builder. And so the spot 
where for many years was a pioneer home, where ministers of the Gospel 
have preached, where young people ha\e often met, where births and deaths 
have been, is soon to be, probably ior many years to come, the home of 
journalism, the aliode of printing presses, and the day home for those who 
do type setting and press work, and who thus will help to enrich with 
printed thought thousands of living homes. But for the historic page, few 
would know, in the years that are expected to come, that in this locality 
was erected one of Lake county's earliest log cabins. 

1843. A GOLDEN WEDDING. 1893. 

Fifty years, as we forward look. 

Seem as years slow moving and long; 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 157 

Fifty years, as we backward look, 

From grayhaired age to childhood's song, 
Seem only as yesterdays gone far by. 

Yesterday ! Yesterday ! How the days fly ! 

Fifty fnll years ha\-e passed away since that marriage ceremony took 
place in the northwestern hiime of the Cedar Lake community whose golden 
anniversary brings us together to-day. 

It will be fitting for me, a youth at Cedar Lake then, an inhabitant here 
now, and having for many years been giving some close attention to the 
times that go over us, to the history which we are making, to the changes 
wh.ich every year brings, to place before you, among the thoughts of this 
hour, some facts connected with that locality and the half century now past. 

Then, fifty years ago, in this northwestern corner of Indiana, across 
which so many thousands have this year passed, this year of 1893, going in 
crowded cars to reach the White City, settlements, homes, institutions, as 
established by descendants of Europeans, were not only comparati\'eIy but 
actually new. Nine years had seen quite a number of families making homes 
in the woodlands on lands which the Pottawatomie Indians had but lately 
vacated. 

In 1843 ^"^'S li3*^' '" ''ll Lake county about as many inhabitants as are 
now in St. John township alone, or about sixteen or se\-enteen hundred; 
we had a few schoolhouses, mostly built of logs : there was a Catholic chapel 
on the Hack place and a Methodist church building in the Hayden and 
Hathaway neighborhood ; there were three or four postoftices ; there were a 
few stores, a few frame luiildings, and one piano. 

Pioneer families had erected cabins and made homes from the Ijorder 
of the Kankakee marsh northward, in the edge of what became known as the 
West Creek woods, extending to the head waters of that little stream known 
as West Creek. Landmarks along that line of settlements were the pioneer 
homes that bore the names of Torrey, Wilkinson, Wiles, Bond, Hornor, and 
Greene. That West Creek stream was just called little, but it formed, be- 



158 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

cause of the wide marshy valley through which it flowed and the quick- 
sands along its course, an impassable barrier between the families on the 
west side and those on the east. As a necessity for tra\el the Torrey bridge 
was built, and afterward the bridge on the road running west from Cedar 
Lake. 

Of about a dozen pioneer families forming the Cedar Lake neighbor- 
hood of the west side of the lake, already, in 1843, some had returned to the 
Wabash, some had gone westward to the new frontier. — it was becominar 
too thickly settled for them, — and some had changed their localities. Of 
these the Greene family, consisting of Dr. Joseph Greene, the early physician 
of the neighborhood and an expert deer hunter, Sylvester Greene and his 
wife and children, and a young brother, Edward Greene, had left their home 
near the head waters of the eastern branch of \\'est Creek, and had settled 
on the north bank of Cedar Lake: and in their place had come into the 
woodland, to a cabin home, roswell hackley, then in middle age, with his 
wife, his son, Edwin, and two daughters, then entering" womanhood, Miss 
Mary and Miss Eliza, healthy, vigorous, enterprising, entering heartily into 
the few varieties of social life which were enjoyed by that little neighbor- 
hood of resolute pioneers. 

At that time the \\'est Creek woods were alive with deer, beautiful 
American red deer, browsing in the winter and then lying down on their- 
snowy beds in the rich, sheltered hazel copses, finding water in those ever 
flowing springs that helped to feed the marshy stream, and in the summer 
enjoying the fine pasture range of twelve miles of woodland valleys and 
ravines, of sunny glades and sheltered nooks. Fifty years ago those woods 
were beautiful, well fitted to be the home of the red deer, the scjuirrels, the 
rabbits, and the quails, or of wood nymphs and fairies of the older days. 
At that time also, while all our nati\-e wild game was abundant, civilization 
was advancing and the conveniences of life were on the increase. Oxen 
were still largely used as domestic animals, and sometimes the ox teams 
would convey the families to the places of Sabi^ath worship. Carriages, cov- 
ered buggies, or buggies without covers, were few indeed. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 159 

The members of the Ball and Hackley families would sometimes go 
up to Crown Point to church together, the place of meeting being then and 
for years afterwards the log court house. 

The winter of 1842 and 1843 was a severe one and was called the "hard 
winter." It commenced in the middle of November and on the eighth of 
the next JNIay cattle barely found sufficient grass on which to live. Many had 
perished for want of food. 

In the spring of 1843 the scarlet fever in a malignant form \'isited 
Crown Point, and for the first time the inhabitants found it needful to select 
a place for the burial of their dead. 

Fifty years, therefore, takes us far back in our life upon this soil as a 
civilized community of white settlers. 

So far as appears in any of our records we celebrate to-day. of those 
married in Lake county, the first Golden Wedding. 

In the summer of 1843, o^'' the east side of Cedar Lake, on Cedar Point 
bluff, a campmeeting was held. Then, how many times before I know not, 
Mr. Wellington A. Clark met Miss ]\Iary Hackle}-. He met her several 
times afterwards. And December 7, 1843. they were married. 

Judge Wilkinson, the first probate judge of Lake county (around whom 
had been, not helping but laughing Indians, when in raising the logs for 
his cabin walls a heavy one would slide back upon his wife and son and 
himself), came up along that belt of woodland to the northern home, to con- 
duct the ceremon)-, "to solemnize" the marriage. He took his rifle along 
with him, and shot one of those red deer before he reached the Hackley 
home. Besides the family of five and the bridegroom and the Judge, there 
were present three guests, making ten in all that day within the cabin walls. 

Over the fifty years of sacred family history between then and now, 
with its lights and its shadows, its joys and its griefs, its successes and re- 
verses, I am not to glance. But I may safely and appropriately say that 
the difference is very great in this county of ours, with its more than one 
hundred schools, its sixty churches, its dozen railroads, its manufacturing 



160 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

establishments, its many towns and villages, its twenty-five thousand in- 
habitants, between this ^^'orld"s Fair year of 1893 and that year of 1843 to 
whicli we have cast a glance backward to-day. Xot only is the difference 
very great here, but great over all the civilized and all the savage world. 

Golden weddings should remind us of securing a home in the Golden 
City. 

HUNTING WILD HOGS. 

How deer were hunted is quite well understood, but not many now in 
Lake county know anything about lumting up wild hogs. A very short ac- 
count of how this was done ought to be of interest to the boys of the 
county who may have some of the hunter instincts but have little game to 
hunt except wild rabbits. 

The word "up," used above, was inserted for a purpose. Wild hogs, as 
this writer knew them, were not hunted like deer, to be shot and killed ; but 
were hunted up when autumn came, by those who claimed them, that they 
might have food and care in the winter. It will appear at once that these 
hogs were not wild in the same sense in which the deer were wild, for they 
had claimers, they liad nominal owners. 

In those early years of the settlement of this county all domestic animals 
were allowed a free range in the woodlands and on the prairies. They had 
no right to go into the settler's gardens and small grain fields, but some- 
times they would do even that. Hogs were to be marked, and this was 
done by clippings in their ears, and each owner's mark was to be recorded in 
a book kept at the county seat. \MiiIe a hog had only two ears it was 
curious how many marks, all different of course, could be made on the 
ears, some marking the right ear. some the left, some markin.g both ears, 
perhaps one unlike the other, some cutting a little notch, some making a 
slit, some marking on the top with a little notch cut off and some marking at 
the bottom, and so in various ways that each man might prove his own. If 
one hungry family stole a hog the first tiling to do was to dispose of the 
ears. Having this matter understood, that hogs going out from their win- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 161 

ter homes, some of tliem not to be seen again till the next winter was near 
at hand, carried their marks with them, the readers of this are better pre- 
pared to understand what is meant by hunting them up. 

The readers should also recall to mind the fact that the hogs of those 
days were not Berkshires, nor Poland China, nor any of the modern im- 
proved breeds; but the long bodied, long limbed racers, that could run 
rapidly, turn on their sides and go through a small opening in a worm fence, 
and. that knew well how to look out for themselves. 

One illustration now of hunting: A colony of these had lived on the 
Bond place, in what in different connections has been called the West Creek 
woods. Some of these were transferred liy purchase to the west side of Cedar 
Lake. They spent the winter contentedly at their new home. In the spring 
they left, and there was no doubt in the owner's mind that they hatl crossed 
Lake Prairie and had gone back to their old haunts in the woods of West 
Creek. Autumn came. It was now 1840, and the owner, with a young 
man twenty-one years of age and a youth of fourteen, proposed to hunt 
them up, those runaway hogs, and luring them back to their new home. 
Each hunter was cjuite well mounted. They were all Xew Englanders and 
had little experience with such animals. They took corn in their saddle 
bags with their lunch. The weather was then delightful and to them all. 
those woods, so new to them and wild, were charming. Along in the 
afternoon, after a quite long search, some hogs were seen. The horses were 
tied. The young man and the youth were instructed to keep hid. that is, 
behind trees out of sight, and the owner, taking some ears of corn, advanced 
cautiously towards the acorn eating hogs, keeping as much as possible a row 
of trees between him and them. At length he threw part of an ear of corn. 
The hogs looked up. It was evident that besides those that had gone away 
in the spring were many young animals with unmarked ears that had never 
tasted corn nor seen a man. And they were wild. \\'ild as young deer or 
wolves. The older ones were wild too now, so far as coming near to a 
man. Some more corn was thrown. The younger ones tasted it. They 



162 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

seemed to like it well. Slowly the man came out from behind his tree. 
The young animals were very wary, but they continued to eat corn while 
the man who threw it to them drew quite near. Then, unfortunately, the 
young man thought he could safely come out from behind his tree. The 
young hogs saw him, they gave a peculiar sound, it was not ? squeal nor a 
grunt, it was more like a liark, there may be some yet li\-ing who ha\'e heard 
such a sound, and immediately, not in a minute but almost in a second, 
there was no hog, no pig in sight. They were seen no more that day, and 
the disappointed hunters mounted their horses and went home, being sure 
that they had learned some lessons in hunting and treating wild hogs. 

It was not considered needful to give up that fine drove of pigs and 
hogs, for one failure. It would not be good stock-raising. So another visit 
to the woods was made by the same three hunters. In the course of the 
day the drove was again found. The same caution and extra caution was 
used in feeding them. They were more bungrv and they liked the corn. 
They at length came up close to the one who fed them. He reached and at 
length mounted his horse and kept feeding those young, now :rusting shoats, 
starting eastward for the prairie. The drove followed quite close to the 
heels of the horse. They went out of the woods, crossed the prairie quite 
rapidly, the two young hunters on their horses bringing up the rear. They 
reached their home before nightfall, gave the trusting animals that followed 
the corn a good place for sleeping and for winter quarters, and the three all 
felt that they knew something about hunting up wild hogs. 

SOME CED.\R L.\KE INCIDENTS. 

About 1680 the first white man of whom any trace has been found near 
the shore of this once Ijeautiful lake, stood upon the well wooded height of 
the northeastern bank. It is high and wooded now. It must have been high 
and wooded then. How is it known that a white man was there then? 
for of his presence there are no written records. Who was he? \\'hat could 
he have been doing there, only some sixty years after the landing of the 
Mayflower at Plymouth Rock? One question at a time, please, and listen to 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 163 

the answers. We know a man was there at some time because he left 
his mark. 

A man sinks into the great ocean and leaves no trace. A man, espe- 
cially a white man, steps into one of our forests called primeval, and he 
mav onlv sink his sharp axe an inch or two into a tree and for years its im- 
press is left. He camps for a night upon the wide prairie and he may lea\-e 
there a tin dish or a tent-pin made of iron, and years afterwards the ob- 
servant pioneer says, as his plowshare touches it, this is not an Indian relic. 
A white man made it and no doubt a white man left it here. And so we 
read in the forest or on the prairie the presence once of a white man. 

The historic fact is this: About 1850 a large oak tree was cut down 
which had grown upon that wooded height, and near the very heart of the 
tree was found a piece of steel, a little instrument an inch and a cjuarter in 
length, with a round shaft the size of a clay pipe stem, the head, on the top 
flat and very smooth, and having twelve sides each smooth and well wrought, 
and the point end not a point but having an edge like an axe. For what 
use this was made no one knows, but that it did not grow of itself in the 
tree is very certain. Even an evolutionist could not believe that. Some 
one drove it into an oak sapling and the wood and bark formed year by 
year, and as the wood could not crowd the steel out it grew over it, covered 
it from human view, protected it from rain and frost, and there at length 
it was found in the heart of a majestic oak. According to the woodmen 
count and estimate, that tree had been growing nearly two hundred years. 
The instrument itself, now in the possession of Mrs. M. J. Cutler, a sister 
of T. H. Ball, shows that it was not the work of an Indian. It came most 
probably from some European workshop. And almost surelv a white man, 
himself from Europe, placed it, for some purpose, in that young oak. Who 
was that white man? Knowledge on that point there is none: Init con- 
jectures may lawfully be offered. 

About the time when that large Cedar Lake oak was young and thrifty, 
men from France were in this then tlioroughly wild region, the first white 



164 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

men, so far as is known, that ever were here. Tlie names of two of these 
are well known in early American history. One was called Hennepin and the 
other La Salle. 

Louis Hennepin was not a Jesuit but a Franciscan. He accompanied 
La Salle's expedition of 1679. Passing through the lakes Erie, Huron, and 
Michigan, these with the men who were with them passed in canoes up to 
a portage on the St. Joseph River, then across to the Kankakee River, and 
down that ri\-er to the Illinois River, and down that river to a place near the 
present Peoria. 

In Februan,' of 1680 Hennepin, as instructed by La Salle, started in a 
canoe on a voyage of discovery. He made an eventful voyage. Returned to 
France, and published in 1683 an account of his explorations. There is no 
probability that he ever saw the Red Cedar Lake. But there is a record that 
La Salle started on foot with three Frenchmen and an Indian hunter, March 
2. 1680. to return to his fort on Lake Ontario, distant about twelve hun- 
dred miles. He had gone down the Kankakee in December, 1679, with 
thirty-two men and eight canoes. He was now returning on foot with 
four companions. If there is any record of that land journey this writer 
has not found it. and so he conjectures that La Salle and his four com- 
panions passed between the Kankakee River and Lake Michigan and camped 
for a night on that wooded high bank of the Red Cedar Lake. It is recorded 
that iiefore leaving the portage in December of 1679 La Salle caused some 
letters to be fastened to trees to convey information to others who might 
pass that way. Possibly then, probably, one might almost say, this little in- 
strument of steel, now in the possession of one who was born at Cedar 
Lake, was used by La Salle to fasten a letter high up on the little oak. 

The incident, in connection with which the foregoing was written, was 
the finding of a curious little steel instrument, Ijy Mr. Ames of Lake 
Prairie, in the heart of a large oak tree, and his giving it to a teacher of the 
Lake Prairie school. Miss Mary Jane Ball. 

In the winter of 1837 and 1838, cjuite certainly in the latter year, a wild 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 165 

animal of the cat family was chased into a swamp whicli was then at the 
head of Cedar Lake. There were no real trees in the swamp, luit an almost 
impenetrable mass of what was called black alder bushes, the water being 
two or three feet in depth. Li the summer these bushes would be covered 
luxuriantly with wild roses. The swamp was many years ago cleared out and 
drained, until which time it was known as the wildcat thicket. It took its 
name from the wild animal that Job W'orthington of Massachusetts, then a 
memljer of the Ball family, succeeded in capturing and killing, with the as- 
sistance of others, in January probably of 1838. Of its dimensions there 
are no records. Imt in the eyes of children it was large, and was surely a 
savage looking animal. There were reports in those early years of other 
animals of this family, catamounts, perhaps, having been heard at night, mak- 
ing their peculiar cry : but there are no records as yet found of any other 
having been killed in the county. 

Two black bears were seen in Lake county in early times, stragglers 
from the thick woods of La Porte and Porter counties, and in the southeast 
part of this county have been some large timber wolves : but the native ani- 
mals of Lake county were seldom dangerous. 

The bald eagles often visited the Lake of Cedars, and they were grand 
birds : but they were looking for tish, and not for little children nor for lambs. 

One lake incident, probably known now, only to this writer, illustrates 
well the power of imagination. To enable the reader to understand it better 
it may be needful to state that in 1837 the iiionts iniilticoiilus or mulljerry 
speculation was at its height in ^Massachusetts, and that ]\Ir. Lewis W'aniner 
brought some plants or cuttings with him. Cuttings would grow, but needed 
protection in the winter. 

Two of the quite young men of East Cedar Lake found one day a 
little mound of sand at the south end, called the foot, of the lake. They said 
to themselves, a little Indian has been buried here. Their curiosity was ex- 
cited. Rather strangely they jM-oposed to dig into it and see. They went 
to work, digging down int(.j the sand, and my informant reported that soon 



166 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

one of them grew sick. The nearness of the decaying body was too much 
for him to endure. He quit work and retired to breathe some fresh air. The 
other young man said he perceived nothing, and kept at work. Soon he 
reached, buried in the sand for protection from the cold of winter, a launch 
of ]\Ir. W'aniner's mulberry cuttings. The other youth soon recovered from 
his nausea. This incident came to the writer so direct that he does not like 
to question it, knowing as he did so well the actors and the informant, and 
knowing that one of them had a strong emotional nature. 

One more incident, slight in itself and yet instructi\e. presses itself for- 
ward for some notice. It is connected with that Cedar Lake Belles Lettres 
Society which has been named, which Solon Robinson visited, quite sur- 
prised to find there some of what Sprague calls "the anointed children of 
education," instead of the Indians whom not long before he had met there 
in a conference. 

There was a youth of the community, somewhat older than the mem- 
bers of the Society who had shown a disposition to make light of their 
writing everything out, even their discussions and addresses. He did not 
think he had any need of writing in order to present his thoughts to others. 
So they invited him to give them an address. He came prompt to the 
hour, as he no doubt supposed well prepared. He had done no writing. At 
least he had no manuscript before him. He took his place gracefully upon 
the floor and opened his address nicely. He proceeded about as far as the 
off-hand young lawyer who was invited to speak at the opening of a bridge, 
about two sentences, and then, while all were giving a respectful attention, 
expecting to hear some oratory, he hesitated, he stopped, he thought, and 
finallv, after one desperate effort, he concluded that undelivered address with 
the lirief peroration. "My thoughts have flown," and sat down. The mem- 
bers were too polite and considerate to show their amusement while he 
was present, their usual exercises went on, and he made no more fun of 
those young writers. 

An attorney-general of the United States once said : "There is no ex- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. J 67 

cellence without great labor. It is the fiat of fate from which no power 
of genius can absolve you." Children learn to skate by trying to skate; 
they learn to swim by trying to swim : and they learn to speak and write by 
trying to speak and write. The power to do any of these things well is worth 
an efifort. A man. now no longer living, who was a power for good in 
Chicago a few years ago. said in sul^stance, that to appreciate beautiful lan- 
guage was partly to command it. and that to command beautiful and forcible 
language was to have a key. with which no man who wished to rule through 
opinion could dispense, to the mind and to the heart of man. 

The Bible itself says. "Words fitly spoken are like apples of gold in 
pictures of silver." 

The after life of my young friend, whose thoughts forsook him in his 
hour of need, was not wdiat man calls a success. And his death, some forty 
years ago, was peculiarly sad. 

He had good capabilities, but in times of need they seemed to be of 
no avail. I certainly will not disclose his name, through my regard for 
what is due to the living and the dead, but I would here tenderly lay a 
wreath of mingled respect and grief upon his nameless grave. 



168 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

JOHN BROWN. 

John Brown, for many years one of the forceful and honored factors 
in financial circles in Lake county and one whose influence has not been a 
minor element among the financiers of northwestern Indiana, has attained to 
prominence through the inherent force of his character, the exercise of his 
native talent and the utilization of surrounding opportunities. He has 
become a capitalist whose business career excites the admiration and has won 
the respect of his contemporaries, yet it is not this alone that entitles him to 
rank as one of the foremost men of his day in Lake county. His connection 
with the public interests of Crown Point is far-reaching and beneficial, and 
he has aided largely in promoting community affairs which have for their 
object the welfare of the general public. He is now the president of the First 
National Bank of Crown Point and he has extensive landed possessions, his 
realty holdings comprising six thousand acres. 

Moreover, Mr. Brown is entitled to mention in this volume from the 
fact that he is one of the nati\e sons of Lake county, his birth having occurred 
in Eagle Creek township, on the 7th of October, 1840. The family is of 
Scotch lineage, and the grandfather, John Brown, was a native of New York 
and took a very active and prominent part in public affairs. He served as 
a major in the war of 1812 and lived to the very advanced age of ninety- 
three years. Alexander F. Brown, the father of our subject, was born in 
Schenectady county. New York, in 1804, and there remained until 1837, 
when he removed to Lake county, Indiana, settling in Eagle Creek township. 
There he secured land from the government and developed and improved a 
farm. He was widely recognized as one of the leading and influential residents 
of this county, and his influence was a marked element in shaping the public 
policy. He became a recognized leader in forming public thought and opin- 
ion, and all who knew him respected him for his loyalty to his honest con- 
victions and his devotion to the general welfare. In his political views he 
was a stanch Whig and he held membership in the Presbyterian church., hold- 
ing office th.erein, taking a very helpful part in its work and contributing 
liberally and generously of his time and means to \-arious church activities. 
He was killed in a runaway accident in 1849 ^\'hen forty-five years of age. 
His wife, who bore the maiden name of Eliza M. Barringer, was a native of 





-6^^^ 




HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 169 

Schenectady county, New York, and there spent the days of her girlhood. 
She hved to be seventy-three years of age and died in Lake county, Indiana. 
On her husband's death she was left to care for a family of five children, one 
of whom was born after his demise. The eldest, a daughter. Mary, now the 
deceased wife of Thomas Fisher, was but twelve years of age at the time of 
the runaway accident which terminated the active and useful career of the 
husband antl father. John was the second of the family. William B., the 
third, is a resident of Crown Point. Anna is the wife of William C. Nichol- 
son, of Crown Point. George, the youngest, died when twenty-nine years of 
age. leaving a widow and three sons. Mrs. Alexander Brown reared her 
family of five children and much credit is due her for their success in life. 
She desired that they should have good educational privileges and thus be 
well fitted to meet life's practical and responsible duties, and she put forth 
every effort in her power to thus qualify them. She was one of the noble 
pioneer women of Lake county and all praise is due her from her children 
and friends. 

John Brown remained with his mother assisting her in the work of the 
home farm until, feeling that his first duty was to his country, he enlisted as 
a member of Company I, Fifth Indiana Cavalry. He joined the army as a 
private in 1861, was promoted to the rank of sergeant and was captured with 
his regiment at Sunshine church in Georgia when on the Stoneman raid. He 
was held a prisoner for seven months. He was in many hard-fought battles. 
He took part in the entire Atlanta campaign until captured with Stoneman at 
Sunshine church, near Macon, Georgia. At Indianapolis, June 2"], 1865, he 
was mustered out. having served for three years, during which time he was 
ever faithful to his duty, following the old flag in many a hotly contested battle. 
where he displayed marked valor and loyalty. 

Mr. Brown at the close of the war retiu-ned to Lake county, where he 
began farming, following that occupation until 1870, when he was elected 
county treasurer upon the Republican ticket. He discharged the duties of the 
position so faithfully that in 1872 he was reelected, and in 1876 
he was chosen for the office of county auditor. In 1S80 he 
was once more elected to that position and served for eight years, 
retiring from the office as he had entered it — with the confidence 
and good will of all concerned. He served for four years as county treasurer 



170 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

and was township treasurer for a number of years, and in all these ditiferent 
public positions he displayed marked business and executive ability as well 
as unfaltering fidelity to the trust reposed in him. In the meantime he had 
become actively identified with financial interests of the county, having in 
1874 established the First National Bank at Crown Point. He was one of the 
charter members and stockholders of this institution, which was capitalized 
for fifty thousand dollars. Its first president was James Burge, who was 
succeeded by David Turner, and Mr. Brown became the third president and 
is now acting in that capacity'. He also has other business interests in the 
county, including a fine stock farm of about six thousand acres located in Eagle 
Creek and Cedar Creek townships. On this place he keeps about one thousand 
head of cattle and his annual sales of stock are very extensive and add materi- 
ally to his income. In business aflfairs he is far-sighted and energetic, his 
judgment is correct and his plans are carried forward to successful comple- 
tion. 

Mr. Brown was united in marriage to Miss Almira Clark, and there 
were three children, a son and two daughters, born to them : Neil, who is now 
residing upon his father's extensive ranch: Mary Alice; and Grace Almira, 
who is the wife of E. S. Davis, of Chicago. For his second wife Mr. Brown 
chose Myrtle E. Ashton, and his present wife bore the maiden name of Jennie 
E. Northrup. 

^Ir. Brown is a member of the Grand Army of the Republic, identified 
with John Wheeler Post No. 149. He is also cormected with the Masonic 
fraternit}- of Crown Point and holds membership with the Knights Templar 
at \'alparaiso. In politics he is a stanch Republican, and it was upon that 
ticket that he was elected to the different positions which he has so capably 
filled. He has indeed been a prominent factor in community interests, and 
although he has conducted important and extensive business affairs he has 
never been remiss in citizenship, but on the contrary has contributed in large 
degree to the general welfare and progress. 

GOTFRIED ^V. \\'AGONBLAST. 

G. W. Wagonblast, who is now living a retired life ni Center township, 
is numbered among those who have long been residents of Lake county, and, 
moreover, is entitled to mention in this volume because he was one of the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 171 

"boys in blue" of the Civil war. His life history began in Germany more 
than seventy years ago, his natal day being the nth of November, 1833. 
He acquired his education in the fatherland and remained a resident of that 
country until eighteen years of age, when, hoping to enjoy better business 
opportunities than were afforded in his own country, he made arrangements 
to come to .America. Bidding adieu to home, family and friends, he crossed 
the .\tlantic and went iirst to Crawford county, Ohio, where he remained 
for about two months. He then came to Lake county, Lidiana, in 1853, 
and worked by the month as a farm hand for six dollars per month. When 
he had become acquainted with the English language and was able to make 
his service of more value, his wages were correspondingly increased, and he 
thereby laid the foundation for his later success. 

Mr. ^Vagonblast was employed as a farm laborer until 1S63, when he 
left the plow and shouldered the musket in order to protect the Union cause, 
enlisting as a member of Company G, Twelfth Lidiana Cavalry. He became 
a private and thus served until the close of the war, taking part in many 
engagements, including the battle of Stone River and others in that part of 
the country. He sustained an injurv bv falling on a rock, which broke some 
of the ribs on the left side, and from this he has never fully recovered. He 
was in the hospital for about eight months and afterward received an hon- 
orable discharge and returned to his home. He then resumed farming in 
Lake county, and has since been identified with its agricultural interests. 

Li 1867 Mr. Wagonblast was united in marriage to Miss Victoria 
Schuster, and to them have been born tweh-e children : John, Cynthia, Sophia, 
Rose, Mary and Lizzie are living, John, at home with his parents and a 
practical farmer and stockman, was educated in the common schools and is 
a member of the Foresters, Court No. 4, at Cnjwn Point ; Cynth.ia was 
educated in the common schools and is at home; Sophia is the wife of John 
Rettig. a farmer in Center township; Rose is the wife of Joseph Walz, a 
farmer of Ross township; Mary is the wife of Peter Mitch, of Center town- 
ship : and Lizzie is at home. 

Mr. Wagonblast owns one hundred and ten acres of rich land, which 
he has acquired through his own labors. His son John now carries on the 
home farm, while he is largely living a retired life, merely giving his atten- 
tion to the supervision of the farm. His life has been a busy and useful 



172 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

one, and energy forms the keynote of his character. He realized in youth 
that labor is tlie basis of all success, and. working indefatigably. he accumu- 
lated the capital that enabled him to in\-est in land, which he developed into 
one of the fine farms of his adopted county and equipped with modern 
improvements. Prior to the Civil war he was deeply interested in the ques- 
tion of slavery, and when the Republican party was formed he joined its 
ranks and voted for John C. Fremont, its first candidate. He has since sup- 
ported its standard bearers and is deeply interested in its success, but has 
never wanted office for himself. He belongs to John ^^'h.eeler Post, 
G. A. R.. at Crown Point and is well known in the county as a man of worth. 
His life stands in exemplification of the phrase the "dignity of labor." and 
he has never had occasion to regret his determination to make the United 

States his home. 

WILLIAM F. HALE. 

William F. Hale, for a number of' years one of the forceful and honored 
factors in commercial circles in East Chicago and one whose influence has 
not 1)een a minor element among the business men of his portion of the state, 
has attained to prominence through the inherent force of his character, the 
exercise of his native talent and the utilization of surrounding opportunities. 
His business career excites the admiration and has won the respect of his 
contemporaries, yet 'it is not this alone that entitles him to rank among the 
foremost men of his adopted city. His connection with the public interests 
here has been far-reaching and beneficial, for he has aided in shaping the 
municipal policy and in promoting many interests for the general good. His 
patriotic citizenship and his interest in community affairs has taken tangible 
form in his zealous labors for the improvements instituted through aldermanic 
measures, and as mayor of the city be is giving a practical, business-like 
administration that is of marked benefit. 

Mr. Hale was born in London, Canada, March i, 1866, and is a son of 
Levi and Roteia (Robertson) Hale. In the paternal line he is a representa- 
tive of a New England family. His grandfather, William Hale, a native of 
Vermont, was a contractor engaged in the building of railroads and public 
works. Leaving his native state he removed to London, Canada, where he 
died when more than sixty years of age. He wedded Mary Robinson and 




y7Cc-.^-cc^^z,,<i.c..^^. ^. 




HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 173 

they reared a large family, including Levi Hale, who was also born in Ver- 
mont. He became a farmer by occupation and removed from the Green 
Mountain state to Canatla, but in 1877 returned to his native country, residing 
for a time in Cleveland, Ohio. Subsequently he went to Missouri, settling at 
Columbia, that state, but later he returned to Cleveland and afterward estab- 
lished his home at Lima, Ohio. He next took up his abode at North Balti- 
more, that state, and thence came to East Chicago in the summer of 1903, 
living now a retired life at this place. He was united in marriage to Miss 
Robena Robertson, who was born in Glasgow, Scotland, and is a daughter of 
James Robertson, also a native of the land of the hills and heather. He was 
a \'ery religious man and a colporteur. He owned a farm i:ear London, 
Canada, and there spent his remaining days, dying at an advanced age. His 
wife, Mrs. Jane Robertson, has also passed away. To Mr. and Mrs. Levi 
Hale were bom seven children, four sons and three daughters, of whom six 
are now living: William F. : James R., of Hallsville, Missouri; Margaret, 
who died aged twenty-three years; Charles L., of Cleveland, Ohio; Aurilla, 
the wife of Samuel Henderson, of Cygnet, Ohio; Rolla P., of East Chicago, 
Lidiana ; and Miss Hallie Hale, of East Chicago. Indiana. 

William F. Hale was a young lad when taken by his parents from Canada 
to Cleveland, Ohio. He attended the public schools of that city and after 
putting aside his text books he learned and followed the hammersmith."s trade, 
devoting several years to that business. He afterward entered the employ of 
the Brownell Improvement Company in Lake county, Illinois, in the capacity 
of superintendent, and in 1900 he entered into partnership with C. D. ]Moon, 
of East Chicago, as dealers in wood, coal, ice and building materials. They 
still conduct the business under the firm style of Moon & Hale, and have 
established a leading commercial enteqirise of the town, securing a good 
patronage which is constantly growing in volume and importance. Their 
business methods are found to be thoroughly reliable, and they have never 
been known to take advantage of the necessities of their fellow men in any 
trade transactions. 

On the I2th of Octolaer, 1891, Air. Hale was united in marriage to Miss 
Elizabeth \\'illiams. a daughter of James and Jane \\'illiams. The circle of 
their friends in East Chicago is almost co-extensive with the circle of their 
acquaintances. ]\Ir. Hale is a valued representative of the Masonic fraternity. 



17i HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

holding membership in East Chicago Lodge No. 595, F. & A. M. ; Hammond 
Chapter, R. A. M.; and Hammond Commandery No. 41. K. T. He is also 
connected with the Benevolent and Protecti\-e Order of Elks, the Modern 
Woodmen of America and the Knights of the Maccabees. 

Politically he has ahvays been a Republican, unswerving in his advocacy 
of the principles of the party. He was first called to public office to serve as 
clerk of East Chicago, which position he filled for twO' years, and then in 
May, 1898, he was elected mayor and by re-election has since been continued 
in the office. Li May, 1904, he was again elected mayor for a term of two 
years. No citizen of East Chicago is more thoroughly representative or more 
devoted to the promotion of her welfare than Mr. Hale, whose name is widely 
known for the prominent part he has taken in local affairs. Without doubt, 
he is one of the most progressive and public-spirited men of Lake county, and 
his means and influence have been used unsparingly in advancing enterprises, 
industries and improvements in this place, now one of the most flourishing 

towns in Indiana. 

\MLLIAM COCHRAN. 

William Cochran, who, with his brother Henry, carries on successful 
farming operations at Section 2 of Eagle Creek township, is to be counted 
among the oldest of tlie native sons of Lake county, for the births of sixty 
years ago in this county were very few in number and the country was 
sparsely settled as compared with its present populousness. Mr. William 
Cochran followed the flag of an Indiana regiment during the Civil war, but 
otherwise his life pursued the cpu'et walks of peace in the occupation of 
farming in Lake county, and he has never married. He and his brother 
have conducted their farm together, and are among the progressive and 
public-spirited men of their township, esteemed and honored in all their 
relations with their fellows. Henry is a man of family, and is likewise a 
veteran of the great rebellion. 

Mr. William Cochran was born at Crown Point, Indiana. December 31, 
1845, a son of John and ^Nlary Ann (Fisher) Cochran. His father was 
born in either New York or Connecticut, and came to Lake county, Indiana, 
about 1840, locating first at Crown Point, but in 1847 nioved to Southeast 
Grove, where he improved a farm and lived till his death, in his eighty-first 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 175 

year. During his residence at Crown Point he served as city councihnan, 
and he was a life-long Republican. His wife was born in London, England, 
and her first marriage was with George Fry, by whom she had two children, 
and William and Henry Cochran were the issue of the second marriage. She 
died at the age of sixty-four. 

William Cochran, who is the younger of the two sons, was about three 
years old when his father moved to Southeast Grove, and he was reared on 
the farm in Eagle Creek township. In August, 1862, he enlisted in Com- 
pany I, Fifth Indiana Cavalry, being a boy of sixteen at the time and the 
youngest member of the regiment. He served three years as a private, and 
participated in several hard battles during the campaigns through Tennessee, 
Georgia and other states. He was captured at the battle of Resaca, Georgia, 
and then spent four and a half months in the prison pen of Andersonville, 
after which he was confined at Charleston, South Carolina, for a month, and 
for two months at Florence, South Carolina, where he was finally paroled. 
On account of disability he received his honorable discharge at Camp Chase, 
Ohio, in 1865, and then returned home to Lake county and engaged in 
farming. He and his brother conduct a well unproved farm of two hundred 
and sixty acres in Eagle Creek township, and have always enjoyed their 
share of prosperity. 

Mr. Cochran is a Republican in politics, and on that ticket was elected 

township trustee in 1890, taking office November 19, and has held it to the 

present time. He is a member of the John Wheeler Post No. 161, G. A. R., 

at Crown Point. 

HENRY COCHRAN. 

Henry Cochran, brother of \\'illiam, was born in Crown Point, 
February 25, 1844, being the elder son of John and Mary Ann Cochran. 
He was reared and educated in Eagle Creek township, and during the first 
part of the Civil war he remained with his parents while his brother was 
away. In November, 1864, he enlisted in Company A, Seventeenth Indiana 
Mounted Infantry, and served as a private till the close of the war. He was 
under General Wilson most of the time. He received his honorable discharge 
at Indianapolis in 1865, and then returned to Lake county and took up the 
farming pursuits with his brother which have been continued so successfully 



176 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

to the present time. They do general farming and stock-raising, and are 

industrious and excellent managers. 

Mr. Henry Cochran is also a stanch Republican, and is a member of 

the John Wheeler Post No. i6i. G. A. R.. at Crown Point. He was married, 

December 5, 1873, to Miss Mary George, who was a daughter of Thomas 

George, and who was born in Cornwall, England, and at the age of seven 

years came to America with her parents. Four children have been born to 

this marriage: Adell, single and at home; Frank, at home; Myrtle, wife of 

Ernest Dickinson, of Lowell, Lidiana ; Alma, attending high school at 

Crown Point. 

JAMES M. BRADFORD. 

James M. Bradford has been prominently identified with the business 
interests and public afifairs of Hammond. Indiana, for over twenty-frve years, 
and is thus one of the old settlers, having come here when the town was in 
its early stages of development and progress, which it has been his privilege 
and lot to further and advance in many ways. He is everywhere recognized 
as a man of great public spirit and enterprise, ecjually energetic in private and 
public afifairs, and willing to sacrifice time and money for the betterment of 
the civic welfare and the institutions of the city which has for so many years 
Ijeen the center of his activity. 

Mr. Bradford was born in Bradford county, Pennsylvania, July 6, 1852, 
being a son of William T. anil Sarah (Gardner) Bradford, natives, re- 
spectively, of Bradford county and of Scranton, Pennsylvania. The Bradford 
family goes back to the famous ^^'illiam Bradford who came over in the May- 
flower. \^'illiam T. Bradford, the grandfather of James M. Bradford, was 
a native of Connecticut, but settled in Pennsylvania at an early day. He ran 
sawmills in Bradford county. He had four children. 

William T. Bradford. Jr., was a millwright, and moved from Bradford 
county to Tonijikins county. New York, where he followed his trade for 
some years, and then moved to Wheeling. West Virginia, where he entered 
the regular army and served five years, and for two years in the home guard. 
He was state major drummer for the state of Pennsylvania about 1834. He 
died at Blair, Ohio, on Christmas day, 1888, at the age of eighty-two years, 
and his wife died in 1885, aged seventy-eight years six months and twenty 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 177 

days. Both were Methodists. Tlie father of Mrs. Sarah Bradford was 
Abraham Gardner, who was a native of Pennsylvania, his father having come 
there from Massachusetts. He was a farmer, and afterward moved to New 
York, wliere lie iHed, in Danln-, Tompkins county. He was poormaster of 
the county for a number of years, and was also justice of the peace and held 
other public offices. He was eighty-seven years old at the time of his death, 
and had been twice married and had seven children. The name was originally 
spelled Gardiner, and the family record goes back to Richard Gardiner, who 
came to Massachusetts with the Pilgrims. William T. and Sarah Bradford 
had ten children, five sons and five daughters, and the fi\e nc^w lix'ing are: 
Lydia Ann. widow of Thomas Geddis, of Diyden. New York; John F.. of 
Cortland, New York; Charles E., of Harvey, Illinois; Delphine, wife of Orn 
S. Cornelious of Dryden, New York; and James M., of Hammond. 

Mr. James M. Bradford lived in Tompkins county. New York, from the 
age of two till twenty-seven. He attended the public schools of Danby, and 
in the interims worked on a farm. At the age of thirteen he began learning 
the painter's trade, which he followed as a journeyman until he was twenty- 
one, and then began doing contract painting. In 1878 he came to Hammond, 
and from then until igoi did contract work and at the same time conducted a 
general merchandise store. He owns city property in addition to his nice 
home at 358 South Hohman street. 

December 31, 1879, Mr. Bradford married Miss Martha Jane Watts, a 
daughter of James and ]\lary Watts. There are three children of this union, 
Anna May, James Franklin and Pearl. Anna May is the wife of Ray Wells. 
Mrs. Bradford is a member of the Methodist church. Mr. Bradford affiliates 
with Garfield Lodge No. 569, F. & A. M.. and with Calumet Lodge No. 601, 
I. O. O F. In politics he is a Republican. A number of years ago he served 
the city as water trustee. He was afterward appointed city commissioner by 
the circuit judge, and was elected county commissioner in 1894. and re-elected 
in 1896, serving six years in all, during which time he originated the move- 
ment for putting the new court house in Hammond and was very instru- 
mental in the successful outcome of that movement. He was also at the head 
of the movement for securing the splendid gravel and stone roads of the 
county, and has always been willing to give his assistance to any like enter- 
prises for the benefit of town or county. 



12 



178 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

WILLARD B. VAN HORNE. 

Among the enterprising and ambitious young men of Indiana Harbor 
who have already attained creditable and gratifying success is Willard B. 
Van Home, who is engaged in the practice of law and has secured a clientage 
which many an older practitioner at the bar might well envy. He is a native 
of Illinois, his l)irth having occurred at his parents' home in Grant Park, 
on the 4th of June, 1879. He is a son of Dr. George Washington and Sarah 
(Mather) Van Home, who were also natives of Illinois. His paternal 
grandfather, Matthew Van Home, born in York state, was of Dutch descent 
and as a means of livelihood followed the occupation of farming. He and 
his wife reached an advanced age and they reared a large family. The 
maternal grandfather of Mr. Van Home was Samuel Mather, viho was born 
in the state of New York and was of English lineage. He, too, followed 
agricultural pursuits and had passed many milestones on life's journey ere 
he was called to his final rest. He wedded Mary Snapp, for his second wife, 
and they had three sons and two daughters, one of whom was Mrs. Sarah 
Van Home. By a former marriage he liad one daughter. 

Dr. George Washington \'an Home is now engaged in the practice of 
medicine and surgery at Grant Park, Illinois, where he has lived for many 
years, and he has not only been a leader in his ])rofession there but has also 
been an active factor in community interests and has exerted considerable 
influence in molding public policy, thought and opinion in his town. He 
has been mayor of the village and was also township treasurer for several 
years. In 1886 he was called upon to mourn the loss of his first wife, who 
died in ]\Iarch of that year, when thirty-one years of age. She was a devoted 
member of the Methodist church. By her marriage she had one son and 
two daughters: Mabel, the wife of George McGoveny, of Mokena, Illinois; 
Willard B., of Indiana Harbor; and Delia. After the death of his first 
wife Dr. Van Home married Miss Cora Parish, of Kentucky, and they had 
one .son and two daughters: Robert R.. now deceased; Agnes, who has also 
passed away ; and Zella Estelle. 

Willard B. Van Home spent his boyhood days in his father's home, 
attending the public schools there, and when he had completed his preliminary 
education he entered Greer College at Hoopeston, Illinois. In 1897 he 
engaged in teaching school and the following year resumed his studies in 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 179 

the Valparaiso College at Valparaiso, Indiana, where he was graduated with 
the class of 1899, on the completion of the scientific course. He was thus 
well equipped by a more specifically literary training to enter upon the study 
of law, which be began in the law department nf the Valparaiso College, 
completing the course by graduation in 1901. In June of that year he was 
admitted to the bar of the supreme court of Indiana and also to the United 
States circuit court for Indiana He then went to Chicago, where be accepted 
a position requiring his services through the day, and in the evenings he 
pursued post-graduate work at the night sessions of Kent College of Law, 
a department of Lake Forest University, being graduated from that institu- 
tion in June, 1902. He came to Indiana Harbor in the following Septem- 
ber, and has since been engaged in practice here. In December of that year 
he was admitted to the bar of the state of Illinois. In bis practice he has 
won very gratifying success, ha\ing already gained a good clientage, and 
his business is continually growing in volume and importance. He is a 
young man of strong mentality, laudable ambition and firm determination, and 
his success will undoubtedly increase as the years pass by. He belongs to 
the Knights of the ]Maccabees, Knights of Pythias and Royal League, and in 
bis political views is a Republican. 

He married, April i-j. 1904, Miss Laura E. Winslow, of Whiting, 

Indiana. 

JOHN BLAKEMAX. 

John Blakenian is an old settler of \\'infield township, and is still resid- 
ing on the place which he bought over fifty years ago. when he was still 
struggling to get a foothold in life in order to reach a substantial and com- 
fortable position in material circumstances. He has gained unusual success 
in his life endeavors, has prospered by his constant industry, and among the 
citizens with whom he has been associated so many years he bears a reputa- 
tion for sterling worth and personal integrity that are in themselves ample 
rewards for a long career of daily toil and high purposes. 

Mr. Blakeman is a native of England and was born in old Warwick- 
shire. November 12, 1824, being a son of Job Blakeman, who lived and died 
in the same shire and same house. John was reared and recei\-ed a \-ery little 
school training in his native place and worked at day labor there until he 



180 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

was twenty-three years old. He tlien came to America, and worked for 
monthly wages on a farm in W'yandotte county, Ohio, until 1851. when he 
came to Lake county, Lidiana, wliich. has been the central field of his 
endeavors ever since. He bought eighty acres of the farm where he still 
resides, and gave his unstinted efforts to its improvement and cultivation. 
He has added to this original tract until he now owns two hundred and ten 
acres, and all the well-kept fences, barns and countless other conveniences 
which mark the farm out as a model have been placed there by himself. He 
has been a resident on the same place so long that no other place could seem 
like home, and now that he has reached the advanced age of eighty years he 
intends to spend the rest of his peaceful days on the homestead which his early 
labors made and adorned. 

Mr. Blakeman is a believer in the political faith of the old Greenback 
party, and he has always given a proper share of his attention to the affairs 
of the world and his locality. He has been married twice. His first wife, 
whom he married in Ohio, was Roxie L. Williams, and she died having been 
the mother of five children, three of whom are living : Caroline, Olive and 
Charles. Mr. Blakeman was married in 1866 to his present wife, Hannah 
J. Miller, and they had one daughter, Amanda, who is the Avife of Jacob 
Steinhilber. The latter is a farmer, and manages Mr. Blakeman's farm. 

JOHN BLACK. 

John Black, a retired farmer and an old settler of Lake county, now 
residing in Crown Point, has had a career to wdiich he may point with justi- 
fiable pride. He landed, a stranger, in America fifty years ago, fifty dollars 
in debt, and with only a vigorous manhood and determined will for capital. 
Nearly all these subsequent years have been spent in Lake county, and his 
early labors caused steady material progress until he is now the owner of 
one of the best farming estates of the county, besides much other property and 
business interests. He is an ex-county commissioner and in other wa3's has 
shown his public-spirited interest in the development and welfare of the 
county where he has so long made his home and built his own substantial and 
prosperous career. 

]\Ir. Black was born in Saxony, Germany, July 24, 1832, and lived there 
the first twenty-two years of his life. He attended the public schools during 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. l^^^ 

the required period to fourteen years of age. an.l the other years spent in 
the fatherland were devoted to farm work, where frugalness and thrift in 
management were virtues so inculcated as to be a permanent part of his 
character and to be responsible for much of his future success. He came 
to America in 1834. After a short time spent in Buffalo. New York, he 
came to Chicago and at Blue Island did railroad work for the Grand Trunk 
for about a year aild a half. He was in Porter county, Indiana, for aljout 
six months, and then located permanently in Lake county, where he began 
his career by working by the month. After getting considerable saved up 
he bought land in Eagle Creek township, and subsequent additions and con- 
tinued prosperity have caused his landed possessions to swell to the amount 
of five hundred and eighty acres. He was a resident of Eagle Creek town- 
ship until 1894, in which year he retired and moved into Crown Point, where 
he built his present fine residence. He is a director of the Commercial Bank 
of Crown Point, and owns considerable property in the city. 

Mr. Black has never voted for any but Repuljlican principles and candi- 
dates, and he has taken as much interest in public matters as his busy life 
would permit. He was elected and filled the office of county commissioner 
for five years, and his administration was so satisfactory that he might have 
retained the office longer had he been willing to serve. He is a member of 
the Lutheran church. 

Mr. Black was married in 1859 to Miss Caroline Beaders. and they 

ha\e seven children living : Plenry. ^^'il!iam. Anna. Ella, Eddie. Hannah 

and John. 

GEORGE B. SHEERER. 

George B. Sheerer, a prominent attorney-at-law of Hammond. Indiana. 
has gained a successful position in the legal profession by his own merits. 
He is of the type of self-made men of whom this C(juntry is so proud. It 
is certainly no mean achievement for a bo}' to start to earning his own 
way at the age of eleven, afterwards as a result of his labor attend school 
and make up in an educational way what he had been retarded in getting 
when a boy. take a law course and gain admission to the bar. and then rise 
to a place of prominence among his fellow-practitioners in the great profession 
of law. Mr. Sheerer has Ijeen engaged in practice in Hammond since 1892, 
and is held in high esteem in the citv and surrounding country. 



182 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Sheerer was born in Shickshinny, Pennsylvania, December 24, 
1866. a .son of Benjamin F. and Ebzabeth (Fritz) Sheerer. His paternal 
grandfather, John M. Sheerer, was the original Sheerer who came from 
southern Scotland to America, locating in \\'ayne county, Pennsylvania, 
where he spent most of his life. He was a canal and railroad contractor, 
and was a very wealthy man, at one time owning all the land on which the 
present city of Scranton stands. He was a soldier in the war of 1S12. 
He died at the age of eighty-eight years, having been a man of remarkable 
constitution and manly vigor. He was never sick a day in his life, never 
took a dose of medicine. \Mien he was eighty-four years old he was physi- 
cally very active. He died from the result of an injury, his l>ack having 
been wrenched while he was mowing. His wife lived still longer, passing 
away at the age of ninety-two years. Her maiden name was Susan Stitely. 
They had a large family. 

Benjamin F. Sheerer, the father of George B. Sheerer, was a Baptist 
minister, and has made home missionary work the principal object of his 
endeavors all his life. He came out west to Illinois in an early day, and 
bought one hundred and fifty acres of land where the Chicago business center 
now is, but he afterwards sold out and went back east. He is now li\-ing 
at Waterton, Luzerne county, Pennsyh-ania, being in his eighty-eighth year. 
His wife. Elizabeth (Fritz) Sheerer, is in her seventy-ninth year. Her 
father, Lucius Fritz, came from Germany when a young man and located 
in Pennsylvania, where he was a farmer. He had been a soldier in a 
German war, and was also in the war of 1812. He married Miss Mary 
Gorman, and they had eleven children. He died at the age of sixty-seven, 
and she when about seventy-three. 

Eight children were born to Benjamin F. and Elizabeth Sheerer, and 
the six now living are: Friend B., of Town Hill, Pennsylvania; Alfred N., 
of Burwick, Pennsylvania; Marion ^l.. of Fond du Lac, Wisconsin; 
George B., of Hammond; Matilda, the wife of R, Gregory, of Muhlenberg, 
Pennsylvania ; and Millard, of Miners Mills, Pennsylvania. The two deceased 
children were Layton L., who was president of the Colfax Seminary, at 
Colfax, Washington; and Celinda, the wife of Rev. James R. Wilson, of 
Svracuse, Xew York. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 183 

George B. Sheerer lived at home in W'aterton. Pennsyhania, until 
eleven years of age. and received his first schooling there. He then started 
out to make his own way, working during the summer at three dollars a 
month and board, and going to school during the winter. He taught school 
in the east for some time, beginning when he was seventeen years old. In 
1884 he came west to Indiana and entered the normal school at Valparaiso, 
where he was graduated in the law department in 1889. In the same year 
he was admitted to the bar of the state. After his graduation he at once 
set to work to pay up his debts contracted in his efforts to school himself. 
In the fall of 1892 he opened his ot^ce for practice in Hammond, and has 
enjoyed an increasing patronage to the present time. 

November 16, 1892, Mr. Sheerer married Miss May E. Wertman, a 
daughter of John and Elizabeth Wertman. They have two children, Ger- 
trude and Mildred. Mrs. Sheerer is a member of the Baptist church. They 
reside at 50 Warren a\enue. where he built a good home in 1900. Mr. 
Sheerer affiliates with the Calumet Lodge No. 601, I. O. O. F., and with 
Hammond Lodge No. 210, K. of P. He is independent in voting, but his 
general political cleavage is Democratic. He is treasurer of the board of 
education, and has been a member of the board for the past six years. 

CHRISTIAN FILLER. 

Christian Fieler, a prominent and well-known farmer of Center town- 
ship. Lake county, is a natixe son and a life-long resident of the county, 
and has enjoyed a prosperous career devoted to the agricultural interests in 
this fine farming section. He is likewise one of the public-spirited men of 
this part of the county, performing his share of the duties of society, and is 
held in high esteem both for his own personal character and for wdiat he has 
accomplished in the world of material things. 

Mr. Fieler was born in Hobart townsliip. Lake county, Indiana, July 10, 
1861 His father, Jacolj Fieler, was a native of Wiirtemberg. Germany, 
and came to America and to Lake county in the year 1854. He was one of 
the early settlers and bought a farm in Ross township, where he continued 
his vocation of farmer until his death in 1877. when in his fifty-eighth year. 
He was a member of the German Methodist church, and a well-known and 
representative citizen of the county. His wife was Catharine Kelver, a 



ISi HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

native of the same province of Germany from which he came, and she died 
at tlie age of sixty-nine years, liaving been tlie mother of five children. 

Mr. Christian Fieler was the only son and the youngest child. He 
was reared in Hohart township, and was educated in the puhlic schools of 
Ross township and also of Chicago. He \\as sixteen years old wlien his 
father died, and he then took the mantle of manly responsibility and carried 
on the w'ork of the farm, in which his father had trained him. His mother 
died in 1884, and he then bought the interest of the other heirs in the old 
homestead and continued his farming there until 1898. He then sold and 
moved to Center township, where he bought his present place on Section 3, 
consisting of one hundred and twenty acres, fertile, well improved and highly 
cultivated. He also has sixty-three acres in \A'infield township and two 
hundred in Ross township, so that altogether he is the possessor of three 
hundred and eighty-three acres of first-class Lake county soil. Besides his 
general farming work he buys and ships stock, and has carried on his exten- 
sive concerns with much individual success and profit. 

Mr. Fieler was married in iqoi to Miss Alice Palmer, a daughter of 
H. D. and Catherine (Underwood) Palmer, one of the prominent families 
of Lake county. Mrs. Fieler was born and reared in Ross township, and 
was educated in the Crown Point schools. ' Mr. Fieler has always been a 
stanch Republican since casting his first presidential vote for Blaine in 1884, 

GEORGE H. HOSKINS, M. D. 

Dr. George H. Hoskins, who has attained prominence as a representa- 
tive of the medical fraternity and is now ser\-ing as coroner of Lake county, 
making his home in \\'hiting, is a native of New York, his birth having 
occurred in Essex, Esse.x county, on the i8th of October, 1872. His father 
was Henry E. Hoskins, a native of Montreal, Canada. In early life, how- 
ever, he was taken to New York, was reared in the Empire state and there 
spent his remaining days, but died on the eve of his departure for the west 
in the year 1875. His widow then came with her two children, a son and 
daughter, to the Mississippi valley, locating at Grant Park. Illinois. She had 
previously learned the milliner's trade, and for about fifteen years was engaged 
in that business at Grant Park, Illinois, thus providing for her children. She 




^;^^^Wu.M%S, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 3 85 

was quite successful in the conduct of her business enterprise and secured a 
liberal patronage. 

Dr. Hoskins was Inil four years of age when he arrived in Grant Park, 
and there he acquired his early education which was supplemented liy one 
year of study at Valparaiso, Indiana. In 1894 he took up the study of medi- 
cine in Northwestern University at Chicago, Illinois, and was there graduated 
in June, 1898. In July of the same year he located at Whiting, where he has 
since been in constant practice. He was the first health officer here, and in 
1902 he was elected county coroner, entering upon the duties of the office in 
lanuarv, 1903. He has secured a large private practice which is indicative 
of the confidence and trust reposed in him by the public. He is a thorough 
and discriminating student, constantly broadening his knowledge and pro- 
moting his efficiency by investigation and research. He is thoroughly in 
touch with modern ideas concerning medical science and practice, and his 
professional duties make hea\'y demands upon his time and energies. 

On the 24th of October. 1900. was celebrated the marriage of Dr. George 
H. Hoskins and Miss Bertha E. Dewey, a daughter of George H. and Celesta 
L. Dewey. They now have two interesting little sons. George H. and 
Harley D. Socially Dr. Hoskins is connected with the Masonic fraternity at 
Whiting, and he was a member of the Baptist church at Grant Park. He 
belongs to the Lake County [Medical Society, and his attention is chiefly de- 
voted to his profession, wherein he has won a creditable name. He closely 
follows the ethics of the medical fraternity and enjoys the entire confidence 
and esteem of his professional brethren as well as of the general public. As 
a citizen, too, he is progressive and has been a co-operant factor in many 
movements for the general good. In politics he is a Republican, and in 
March, 1904, he was nouiinated by that party for his second term as coroner 
of Lake county. He completed his new residence on Sheridan a\enue. near 
One Hundred and Nineteenth street, in the fall of 1903. For 1903 Dr. Hos- 
kins was worshipful master of Whiting Lodge No. 613. F. & A. M. He is 
also a m.ember of the Owls Club. 

JOHN S. REILAND. 

In an analvzation of the character and life work of John S. Reiland 
we notice manv of the salient traits which have marked the German nation 



186 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

for many centuries, the perseverance, reliability, energy and unconquerable 
determination to pursue a course that has been marked out, and it is these 
sterling qualities which have gained to Mr. Reiland success in life and made 
him one of the substantial and valued citizens of East Chicago. He is now 
living a retired life, for through his energy and capable management in 
former years he gained a comfortable competence that now enables him to 
put aside further business cares and to enjoy the fruits of his former toil. 

Mr. Reiland was born in Prussia. Germany, on the 17th of March, 1834. 
His paternal grandfather, Dominicus Reiland, was long in public life, holding 
office for twenty-four years in the city of Berlin and discharging his duties 
with a promptness and fidelity that won him the highest commendation and 
respect. His death occurred when he had attained an advanced age. His 
family numljered four children, including John Reiland, the father of our 
subject. He, too. was born in Germany, became a trader of that country 
and died in the fatherland at the age of seventy-three years. He had wedded 
Miss Mary Thomas, also a native of Germany and a daughter of Stephen 
Tiiomas, who was an active factor in industrial circles in the community in 
which he made his home, operating a distillery and twenty-four lime kilns. 
He died at the ripe old age of eighty-two years. In his family were four 
children, two sons and two daughters, yir. and I\Irs. John Reiland became 
the parents of five children, four sons and one daughter, but only two are 
now living, the sister of John S. being Annie, who is the widow of Mathias 
Jones and is living on the old Reiland homestead in Germany. The father 
died at the age of seventy-three years, while his wife passed away at the 
age of eighty-nine years. Both were communicants in the Catholic church. 

John S. Reiland spent the days of his boyhood and youth in Germany, 
continuing a resident of that country until nineteen years of age, during 
which time he acquired a good practical education in the public schools. He 
also learned the carpenter's trade and was thus (|ualifien to earn his living 
as an artisan. In the year 1854 he crossed the Atlantic to America, having 
heard very favorable reports concerning the new world and its business oppor- 
tunities. He located in W'illiamsport, Pennsylvania, and there took out his 
naturalization papers, for he had made his way to this country to become 
a citizen of the United States. Believing that he might have still better 
business privileges and advantages in the middle west, he luade his way to 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 1S7 

Illinois in 1861, settling in Peru, that state, in the month of October. There 
he lived for about five years or until 1866, since which time he has made 
his home in Lake county, Indiana. On removing to this locality he secured 
a tract of land and was engaged in farming until 1872, after which he became 
proprietor of a hotel in South Chicago, conducting the same until 1888. 
Since that time he has lived in East Chicago and is now enjoying a well 
merited rest from further business cares. 

On the 6th of August, 1856, Mr. Reiland was married, the lady of his 
choice being Miss Henrietta Meisenbach. a daughter of Jacob and Margaret 
Meisenbach. They became the parents of the following children : Jacob C, 
born September 8, 1857: John, born August 2-j, 1859; Mary, deceased, born 
January 17, 1862; Lena, born October 17, 1864: Antony, born February 17, 
1866; Nicholas, torn January 2-j, 1868; William, born November i, 1869; 
Frank, born October 30, 1872: George, born August 18, 1876: Carrie, born 
August 6, 1881; Albert, born October 31, 1883. Of these Jacob i.s street 
commissioner and water inspector in East Chicago. He married Mis= Mar>' 
Mahr, and they have three children. William, John and ]\Iollie. John, who 
is a carpenter by trade, and is following his vocation in East Chicago, married 
Lena Smith and has one daughter. Pearlie. Mary died Januan,- 10, 1893, 
was the wife of John D. Williams and had one daughter. Pearl. Lena is 
the present wife of John D. Williams and they make their home in East 
Chicago. Antony, who is a bricklayer, is married and has three children, 
Grace, George and Henry. Nicholas follows the pursuit of boiler-making. 
William is serving as city judge of East Chicago. Frank is an electrical 
engineer of Cleveland, Ohio, and is married. George is an attorney of East 
Chicago. Carrie is the wife of A. C. Huber. and they have a daughter. 
Helen Ruth. Albert is now a student in the University of Michigan at 
Ann Arbor. 

Mr. and Mrs. Reiland and their family are members of the Catholic 
church, and politically he is a Republican, deeply interested in the success of 
his party. He served as alderman for several years, and during that time 
exercised his official prerogatives in support of every measure that he be- 
lieved would contribute to the general improvement and upbuilding. In 
1903 he built a beautiful home in East Chicago at the corner of One Hundred 
and Fortv-eighth street and \\'hiteoak avenue, where he is now living' retired. 



188 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

The liope that led him to leave his r.ative land and seek a home in .\merica 
has been more than realized. He found the opportunities he sought, which, 
1)y the way, are always open to the ambitious, energetic man, and making the 
best of these Mr. Reiland has steadily worked his way upward. He pos- 
sessed the resolution, perseverance and reliability so characteristic of people 
of the fatherland, and his name is now enrolled among the best citizens of 

East Chicago. 

ANDREW A. SAUERMAN. 

Andrew A. Sauerman, whose interests are thoroughly identified with 
those of Lake county so that he is at all times ready to lend his aid and 
co-operation to any movement calculated to benefit this section of the state 
or advance its substantial development, is a native son of Crown Point, his 
l)irth ha\ing occurred on the 22(\ of February, 1838. The family comes of 
German lineage and was founded in America bv Nichols Sauernian, the 
grandfather of our subject, who was born in Germany and crossed the Atlantic 
to America. He possessed strong purpose and laudable ambition, and as the 
years progressed won a fair measure of prosperity. His son, John C. Sauer- 
man, was born in Bavaria, Germany, and when fourteen years of age crossed 
the .\tlantic, locating in Chicago. There he learned the harness-maker's 
trade, and in 185 1 he remo\'ed to Crown Point, where he engaged in business 
as a manufacturer of harness, continuing in that line for about twenty-four 
years or until 1875, when he put aside private business interests in order to 
perform public service, having been elected county treasurer of Lake county. 
He filled the office for four years and then retired to private life. ^:pending 
his remaining da}s in the enjoyment of a well-earned and richly merited rest. 
He died in the year 1886. at the age of fifty-four years, and his value as a 
citizen and friend made his death the cause of general sorrow in his com- 
munity. He was a life-long Republican, ever active in the local circles of 
the party, and in religious faith was a Lutheran. His wife bore the maiden 
name of Pauline Stroehlein and was likewise a native of Bavaria, Germany, 
where she was reared. She came to America in early womanhood and for 
many years she traveled life's journey as the wife of John C. Sauerman. 
Her death occurred in 1900, when she was seventy-one years of age. This 
worthy couple were the parents of four children, one of whom died when 
only a year old, wdiile Flora died in 1888. Margaret T. is the widow of 
Dr. Llenry Pettibone, of Crown Point. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 189 

Andrew A. Saiierman, the second in order of birtli of this family, was 
reared at Crown Point, attended the pnbHc schools there and after acquiring 
his elementary education attended college at Valparaiso, Indiana, the insti- 
tution being known as the Northern Indiana Normal School. He was grad- 
uated in the business department and after returning to his home he fol- 
lowed the harness-maker's trade, which he had previously learned, following 
that pursuit until 1876. In that year he entered the office of the county 
recorder as deputy, acting in that capacity for two years, and in 1878 he 
became assistant cashier of the First National Bank, which position he 
filled until January, 1896, when he was elected cashier of the bank. This 
has been his connection with the institution to the present time, and the 
success of the bank is attributable in no small degree to his efficiency and 
fidelity. He is a popular cashier, his obliging manner and unf:dtering 
courtesy being greatly appreciated by the patrons of the institution, while at 
the same time he is most loyal to the interests of the corporation which he 
represents. Since 1884 Mr. Sauerman has been a member of the board of 
directors of the First National Bank. 

In 1880 was celebrated the marriage of Mr. Sauerman and Miss An- 
toinette Aurich. of Hancock, Michigan, a daughter of Michael and Mag- 
dalena (Diem) Aurich. She was born in Sheliovgsn. W^isconsin, and was 
reared in Hancock, Michigan, and she died on the loth of March. 1903. 
leaving two children : Harvey A., who is engaged in the drug business at 
Valparaiso; and Pauline M., who is attending school at Crown Point. Mr. 
Sauerman is a member of the Lutheran church, of which he is serving as a 
trustee, and he is well known throughout the county as a stanch Reimblican, 
having considerable influence in local political circles. He is a rein'esenta- 
UvQ of our best type of /\merican manhood and chi\alry. By perseverance, 
determination and honorable effort he has overthrown the obstacles which 
barred his path to success and reached the goal of prosperity, while his 
genuine worth, broad mind and public-spirited interest have made him a 
director of public thought and action. 

JOHN BUCZKO\\SKI. 

The prosperity and progress of every community depend upon its busi- 
ness activity, its commercial interests and industrial development, and those 



190 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

who are foremost in the public h'fe are the men who are controlHng the 
veins and arteries of traffic. Mr. Buczkowski has become well known in 
connection with mercantile circles in Whiting, where he is now conducting 
a grocery and confectionery establishment. He deserves great credit for the 
success he has attained as it has been won entirely through his own well 
directed efforts guided by sound business judgment and permeated bv trust- 
worthy methods. 

Mr. Buczkowski is a native of Germany, his birth having occurred on 
the 14th of June, 1857. He was but a small boy when he came to America 
with his parents, the family home being first established in LaPorte county, 
Indiana, near Westville. The father was a farmer by occupation, and John 
Buczkowski was reared upon the home farm, early becoming familiar with 
the duties and labors that fall to the lot of the agriculturist, in connection 
with the cultivation of the fields. He remained a resident of LaPorte county 
until about thirty-three years of age, and in his boyhood days attended the 
common schools, thus becoming equipped for life's practical and responsible 
duties. After entering upon his business career he had charge of a depart- 
ment for the street car company for a time and later was in charge of the 
convicts of the state prison at Michigan City for one year. In 1889 he 
came to Whiting, where he opened a saloon, which he conducted for five 
years at one location. He then removed to Robertsdale or North Ham- 
mond, where he continued in the same business for about five years. He 
then retired from active business for a time, but indolence and idleness are 
utterly foreign to his nature and he afterward entered trade circles. He 
erected three buildings in North Hammond, and he now owns four buildings 
there. He also bought and sold land and speculated to a considerable extent 
in real estate, doing a business which has resulted profitably. He is now 
connected with the firm of Smith & Bader in the real estate business, oper- 
ating under the name of the W'hiting Land Company. He has assisted 
materiallv in the upbuilding and improvement of North Hammond and of 
\\'hiting, having erected two houses here, and he is known as one of the 
most enterprising and progressive men of the town. As proprietor of a 
grocery and confectionery store he is conducting a large and growing busi- 
nesS; and in the different fields of trade with which he has been connected 
he has met with creditable success. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 191 

^Ir. Buczkowski was elected justice of tlie peace at the same time that 
Judge Jones was elected to represent North Hammond, W'hiting and East 
Chicago in North township. Mr. Buczkowski has taken quite an acti^•e part 
in public affairs, and is a Democrat in his political views where national 
questions are involved, but at local elections casts his ballot independently of 
party ties, supporting the candidates whom he thinks best qualified for office. 
May 17. 1904, he was appointed by the council as street commissioner of 
Whiting. 

In 1881 was celebrated the marriage of John Buczkowski and IMiss 
Mary Przyblinski, and they now have three children, two sons and a daughter, 
namely : Harry. Frank and Vangeline. Mr. Buczkowski is well known in 
Lake and LaPorte counties, where he has many friends, and his consecutive 
endeavor, strong purpose and laudable ambition have formed the foundation 
upon which he has builded liis business success. As the architect of his 
own fortunes he has builded wisely and well, and may justly be called by 
the somewhat hackneyed but very expressive title of a "self-made man." 

JOHN L. KEILMAN. 

John L. Keilman. general merchant and a director in the First National 
Bank at Dyer, is an influential and progressive young business man of Lake 
county, where he has had his life-long residence. He early marked out 
business pursuits as the object of his career, and he has been steadily advanc- 
ing to greater success in his enterprises since he took up active life some 
fifteen years ago. He is well known throughout the county, not only for his 
connection with commercial and financial affairs but also as the bearer of a 
famil}- name that will always be entitled to honor and esteem in Lake county, 
with whose growth and material development the first American Keilman 
became identified in the pioneer epoch, and the family influence and resources 
have been increasing to the present time. 

Mr. Keilman is the youngest son of Leonard and Lena (Austgen) 
Keilman, who have lived in Lake county for sixty years and whose history, 
together with other facts concerning this prominent family, will be found on 
other pages of this volume. John L. Keilman was born in St. John town- 
ship, Lake county, August 21, 1867, and was reared in his native place. 
After receiving a common school training he spent two years at the Catholic 



15*2 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

seminary at St. Francis, near Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he took a busi- 
ness course. After his return home he engaged in the general mercantile 
business, in 1890, in partnership with his father. In 1892 he sold out his 
interest to his father, and spent the following nine months sight-seeing in 
California and the Pacific coast. He returned once more to engage in busi- 
ness with his father, under the name of L. Keilman & Son, and this firm is 
still doing business at the old stand which was established nearly fifty years 
ago. They have a large stock of general merchandise and do a large busi- 
ness with the surrounding district. Mr. Keilman was one of the men who 
organized the First National Bank in Dyer, in 1903. and is now one of its 
directors. 

Mr. Keilman married, October 3, 1895, Miss Emma Schaefer, who was 
born October 3, 1871, and is also a native of Dyer, St. John township, a 
daughter of Jacob Schaefer. They have no children. 

JOHN J. BRENNAN. 

For ten years John J. Brennan has been a resident of Roby, where he 
has large property interests and where in public circles he is well known, his 
influence having been a strong element in shaping public policy here during 
the decade in which he has been identified with the city. He is a typical busi- 
ness man of the present time, energetic and enterprising, who quickly recog- 
nizes business possibilities and also is cognizant of the fact that the present 
and not the future holds his opportunity. He knows that the moment for 
action is not to come, but uses his powers daily to the best advantage, and his 
life, therefore, has been crowned with successful accomplishment. 

Mr. Brennan is a native of Ohio, his birth ha\-ing occurred in Urbana, 
Champaign county, on the 8th of August, i860. He is a son of Edward and 
Bridget (Ryan) Brennan both of whom were natives of Ireland, and having 
crossed the Atlantic to America they became residents of the Buckeye state. 
Mr. John J. Brennan was reared in the city of his nativity, and pursued his 
education in the public schools. After putting aside his text books he en- 
tered upon his business career in a grocery store in the capacity of a shipping 
clerk and for about a year he remained in that establishment, which business 
was carried on along both wholesale and retail lines. In 1876 he went south 
and completed his education in the Southwestern Presbyterian University. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 193 

He afterward became registered letter and money order clerk in the postot^ice 
at Clarivsviile, Tennessee, where he remained for four years. He then re- 
turned to Ohio, again locating in his native city, and was engaged in the coal 
business with his father for about two years. In 1887 he removed to Chicago, 
where he accepted the position of bookkeeper with the United States Rolling 
Stock Company, doing business at Hegewisch, Illinois. He continued as 
accountant with that company for seven years and came to Roby in 1894, 
since which time he has been a resident of this city. Here he is engaged in 
the saloon and restaurant business. He is also one of the principal land- 
holders of Roby, and likewise owns property in Illinois. 

Mr. Brennan has been very active and influential in politics and is a 
stanch supporter of the Democratic party, believing that its principles contain 
the best elements of good government. In 1901 he was elected a member of 
the Hammond city council from the Fourth ward. He is one of the active 
members of that body, progressive and public-spirited in his citizenship and 
taking an active and helpful interest in everything that pertains to the general 
welfare. Viewed in a personal light, he is a man of excellent judgment, 
fair in his views and highly honorable in his relations with his fellow men. 
His life has been kindly, his actions sincere, his manner unaffected, and his 
example is well worthy of emulation. 

^IICHAEL GRIMMER. 

iMichael Grimmer, who is serving for the second term as county auditor 
of Lake county and is a resident of CrovvU Point, was born in Ross township, 
this county, on the i8th of July, 1853, and his entire career has been such 
as to command the confidence, good will and respect of his fellow-citizens. 
His father, ^lichael Grimmer, made his way to Chicago in 1841, and after 
residing in the embryo city for a number of years took up his abode in Lake 
county, Indiana, in 1849. He was one of the pioneers of this section of the 
state, and he devoted his energies to agricultural pursuits until his death, 
which occurred in 1853. when h.is son Michael was but eight weeks old. 
He left beside his widow four children, two daughters and two sons, the 
eldest being then but little more than twelve years of age. The mother 
afterward married again, and Michael Grimmer remained at home with his 
step-father until about sixteen years of age, assisting in the operation of the 



lt»4: HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

home farm. He then started out in hfe on his own account, and though 
he had but hniited school privileges to equip liim for the duties of the business 
world he possessed energy and determination, and resolved to win advance- 
ment. By working as a farm hand he earned the money that enabled him 
to attend school in the winter months, and later he began teaching in the 
district schools, being connected with that profession for ten years. In 1880 
he embarked in general merchandising at Schererville. where he continued 
for seventeen years. His business was capably conducted, and his enter- 
prise and fair dealing formed the substantial foundation upon which he 
budded his success. 

In the meantime ]\Ir. Grimmer had been called to public office. He is 
a .stanch Republican in his political views and has taken an active interest in 
the work of the party throughout the period of his majority. While engaged 
in merchandising at Schererville he served for eight years as trustee of 
St. John township, and in 1897 he was elected auditor of Lake county, serving 
so faithfully during the succeeding three years that in 1900 he was re-elected 
and is now the incumbent in that office. He discharges his duties with, 
marked promptness and fidelity, arid his public career is one which has gained 
for him unabating confidence and respect. 

In 1879 ^Ir. Grimmer was united in marriage to Miss Lena Newman, 
a daughter of Joseph and Mary Newman, and thev have two children : 
Frances, who is in the office with her father: and Fred, who is attending 
school. ]\Ir. Grimmer is one of the leading citizens of Lake county, where 
he has spent his entire life. He is a self-educated as well as a self-made man. 
Starting out in life for himself ere he had attended school to any e.xtent. he 
became imbued with a laudable ambition to attain something better, and has 
steadily advanced in those walks of life demanding intellectuality, business 
ability and fidelitv. To-day he commands the respect and esteem not only 
of his communit\- but of peojjle throughout the state. Over the record of his 
public career and his private life there falls no shadow of wrong, for he has 
ever been most loyal to the duties of friendship and of citizenship, and his 
history well deserves a place in the annals of his nati\-e county. 

JOHN G. BOHLING. 

John G. Bohling, a prominent farmer of St. John township, has resided 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 195 

in this part of Lake county all his life an.d carries on his extensive agricult- 
ural operations on the same farm on which, he was born, and which his 
father settled in the early days of the county's existence. He has always 
been known among his neighbors and fellow-citizens as a man of ability 
and energy and progressive spirit, and he has so managed his afifairs as to 
gain a substantial place in the world and surround himself with comfortable 
circumstances. 

]\Ir. Bohling was born in St. John township. Lake county, October ii, 
1855, a grandson of Andrew and a son of John Bohling, both well known 
men in the early settlement of Lake county. His father was born in Ger- 
many, November 26, 1823, and was reared there to the age of fifteen, when 
he was brought by his father to America. They lived in Joliet, Illinois, for 
two years, and in 1841 came to Lake county, Lidiana. Here John Bohling 
married, in 1843, Anna Mary Shillo, who was -also born in Germany and 
came to America in 1842. She died at the age of seventy years After their 
marriage they located on a tract of unimproved land in St. Joh.n township, 
and he gave his attention to its improvement and cultivation for many years, 
and still resides on it. with his son John. He is now past eighty years of 
age, and is revered as one of the sterling pioneers of Lake county. Of his 
seven children only four are now living, as follows : ^lagdalen, wife of Bart 
Schaefer, of Center township, Lake county ; Susanna, wife of Nick Alaginot, 
of St. John township; Joseph P., of Hammond; and John G. 

Mr. Bohling, the youngest of the family, was reared on the farm where 
he still lives, and received his early education in the schools of St. John 
township. On his fine farm of one hundred and si.xty acres he raises general 
crops and stock, and has been able to extract more than a good livirig from 
his fertile soil, so that he ranks among the progressive and representative 
farmers of the township. Li national afifairs he has always given his alle- 
giance to the Democratic party, but \-otes for the man in local afifaiis. He 
and his family are members of the Catholic church in St. John, the patron 
saint St. John's. 

April 2/. 1880. Mr. Bohling married Miss Lillosa Schmal. who was 
born in the village of St. John, Lake county. February 4, 1857, and is a 
daughter of .\dam Schmal. Five children have been lx)rn to Mr. and Mrs. 
Bohling: Clara, the wife of Frank A. Beiker, of Crown Point: William, at 
home; Eleanor; Norbert; and Joseph A., deceased. 



U>C HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

LEVI E. BAILEY. 

On the roster of county officials of Lake county appears the name of 
Levi E. Bailey, who is the present treasurer and is a most faithful custodian 
of the public exchequer. He is living at present in Crown Point, and through- 
out this portion of the state he is widely and favorably known. By birth, 
training and preference he is a western man, imbued with the spirit of enter- 
prise and advancement which is characteristic of the middle west and has 
led to its rapid growth and development. 

Mr. Bailey was born in A^ellowhead township, Kankakee county, Illi- 
nois, Tanuarv 9, 1858. It is known that his ancestors lived at one time in 
North Carolina, afterward in Pennsylvania and still later in Ohio. His 
paternal grandfather, John Bailey, became one of the pioneer settlers of 
LaPorte county, Indiana, locating there during tlie early boyhood of Josiah 
B. Bailev. On leaving LaPorte county Josiah B. Bailey took up his abode 
in Lake county with his parents, and was here reared. He was also married 
here, the lady of his choice being Miss N'ancy Kile, who was born in Lake 
countv, Indiana. Immediately after their marriage they removed to Kanka- 
kee countv, Illinois, where the father followed the occupation of farming until 
1866 He then returned with his family to Lake county, locating in West 
Creek township, where he spent his remaining days, his death occurring when 
he was sixtj^-seven years of age. He was a verA- public-spirited man, took 
an active and helpful interest in the building of roads and gave a generous 
and zealous support to the measures for the public good. In politics he was 
a verv stanch Republican. His wife died at the age of thirty-eight years. 
In the family were four children, three sons and a daughter, all of whom are 
now residents of W^est Creek township. Lake county. 

Levi E. Bailey is the eldest and was but si.x years of age when the family 
returned to Lake count}-, so that he was reared here. He attended the com- 
mon schools, worked on the home farm and remained under the parental roof 
until twenty-two years of age, when he started out in life on his own account. 
He engaged in farming in Kankakee county, Illinois, where he remained for 
three years, and then again came to Lake county, settling in ^^"est Creek town- 
ship. There he carried on general agricultural pursuits until November. 1902, 
when he was elected county treasurer. On the ist of September, 1903, he 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. I'JT 

took up his abode in Crown Point. He took possession of the office on tlie 
1st of January, 1903, and is now capably discharging the duties thereof. He 
owns a farm of four hundred and twenty acres in West Creek township, which 
is now rented. He is also a stockholder in the Lowell National Bank. ]\Iarch 
19, 1904, Mr. Bailey was re-nominated for a second term as treasurer. 

In 1880 occurred the marriage of Mr. Bailey and ]Miss Emma Hayden, 
a native of ^\'est Creek township. Lake county, and a daughter of Daniel and 
Louisa Hayden, who were pioneer settlers of this county. Four children 
graced this marriage : Nancy, the wife of Loren Love, of West Creek town- 
ship ; Murray ; Merritt ; and Bennett. 

Mr. Bailey takes a veiy active interest in local political affairs and is an 
unfaltering advocate of Republican principles, believing firmly in the prin- 
ciples of the party and endorsing the \'arious planks of its platform. He is 
identified with the Knights of P}'thias fraternity and the Independent Order 
of Foresters, at Lowell, and he is well known in fraternal, political and agri- 
cultural circles throughout the county. 

RICHARD FULLER. 

Richard Fuller was for some years one of the extensive farmers of 
Lake county, operating one thousand acres, and his name has been a prom- 
inent and honored one in connection with agricultural interests and with 
the dealing in hay, grain and stock. He is now proprietor of the Fuller House 
at Shelby, and few men of this part of the state have a wider or more fa\-orable 
acquaintance than has Richard Fuller. Moreover, he is entitled to distinc- 
tion as a self-made man, whose success is attributable directly to his own 
efforts 

Mr. Fuller was born in Athens county, Ohio, February 12, 1829, and 
has, therefore, passed the seventy-fifth milestone on life's journey. His 
parents were James and Lydia (Dodge) Fuller, both of whom were natives 
of Maine. His maternal grandmother, however, was born in Scotland and 
w'as brought to America when a little maiden of seven summers. The 
paternal grandfather was born in Maine and was of English descent, the 
family having Ijeen founded in America in early colonial days. When the 
colonists attempted to throw off the yoke of British oiipression he joined 
the continental army and fought for the independence of the nation. Both 



15^ HISTORY OF L.\KE COUXTV, 

Mr, «ii>d Mirsi. Janies Faller wiene reareti aixi evtwcAted ia ibc Piii* Tre« state, 
*«ihJ irt>«r nwrriAg* \x-«s tliene cfk^iratied They becanie the parents of ek>«n 
chiktjwiv, ot wiboaii'i RiohsTd Frailer is tihe tentli chiM asud nijwh 5icvn, 

"Rk-hainJ F-nl)er was rn ihi* wmth vear wihen be ounw to Labe oowmy, 

:'^ 'hi? fatheir . ' Vr, The tami'h- K-nnie wa? established in 

^v\,.. . V vViv toAVTJsMjv >>i...... ,^ tAther entered land tTiMM the giweTmiiem 

ATK^ iwfvrox'ed a tamv spendii^ hfe TonaTiiiT^ tiays tlwreoni, hts death oc- 
oaTrir^ when be xirjis m M$ ssex^wy-^first year, Hfe xriie passed ai«ra}i when 
AKvnt the satne «§«, They were pJcsneer settters ■of La^ coflsmty air>d »mv«3y 
assisted m the eariy dex^'kipniient awd progiwss isf tihi? piimoin of the sstaite. 

R-Jchard "~ ". ^ " " - , ■ ;x-«n m one of the old leg schcol hoiases 

. ■ of the war he *ssl^ . , - —, ■ -. ^ vlaTid 

aith? i^A^lopa-r^ the homw tawix He gave hts father iflne heiiefit of his semces 
he ha».l attained his Tfja^^^iW", aand dnen er^^ged in farmrr^ •im ihss tmn 
aocowiift in Ce<3aT Cwek towsusJinip, He later j«niioved t© West Oree?^ towtf- 
>' '.,'., , " " tS:^^ 'wheal he came to 5', " ', . r ed 

^. . -. - ^ ^" -r trme he oipcw;.*;.. v .< , - ■■d 

... - ... . - , - . H-as extensiivieJy er^jaged . ig 

iw hay, ^jrai-n atid iJtodc tnwil aibowt iten y«ars .^a when he iparchased 9ns 
present place, the FnTler Hoiose, which he is mow <-i.tnd«criT^. 

1*1 11S54 Mr, Fualer 'w^s minmed wu wjanrii^ ito Miss IDehorah Hale, a 
natix* of M/ . "\- x^:as T«aTetl hcw^'ver, in iLake ooimty, iTidiana. She 
'd?ei9 m 1^5. vv. V .:g ele^ien chi"".""^- '" ' -"--— -^-y--;-. ' - ■-■• -_-^ -.-,j 
inwie ai* h%-hi^- at this '»Tfl»r^> 1- - - .• _ - i;h 

school coarse, is wjatried asid a faraier at iRose in WV^io^scm coanty, KaTJsas. 
OsTa A'deha was ie<ftoca*ed in ithe ^rrsnomaT schooJs 5fJ»d is ucwr a ir«B<3enii of 
Shefhy, tiJtis >cciorfly, Jtow^ Pra-nltlm, a <;or.«r»c»csr aind ImJIiSer -of Oamvcm 
City, OoiJorado. is a - - ' ' ' - . , ' - . ^ " S"? 

- - of Xe\' ... - :ist !lrr proiiess?on and 

was edncated in ibe <3ty ^tdhere ^ uowr Tendes. Richard Edwin is wjamiwd 
atjd is « swcccssfdl t«staTfra*enr at MonoTi, IndJaafia, Ha-nn^ Ann is at 
s -1- -^ V- . - -, farmer at SbeillM-, was «ednca!ted in 

ir>e commor. scho^.s ,'::;.. ;s .r. ^^'cm^xrat to pdBncs, Laxrra Jeafmene is ^dic 



I lis Tom' ()!•■ I.AKI'. (YHJNTY. 199 

will" (if J:iiiu's I'llink, .1 pri is]ii'ri 'lis slucl^ I'.irn'cr I'l' ( Jicli.iicl (irn\i\ liulimia. 
A.qncs I )clii ii ;ili, ilic xmmqi'sl nl llic rliiMicn. is llic wile ol Jnlin l'>'>ri;', who 
is fililni (i| llic AVvi'.v /\'rr7(Ti" :il I li:i\i'r. Iiiili;iii;i. 

\l ilu- iiiiic (il llic (nil will Mr. I'lillcr scrxcii for six nmntlis as a 
iiiciiiIht 111 ( iiiii|i:iii\ I''. I'lfu liflli liiilianii NUIiiiilccr liifaiilrv. and was 
tlicii lMiii(iiaM\ (liscliaiLM'il li\' rcasmi of tin- cossalicni nf linsiilitics, July 27, 
liSf)5. I U' is a hciiHH'ial ill Ills |i(i|iiu'al \ icw s aiiil a suppdrUT (il W. J. 
llryaii. Me lias lu'cii a usulciil nl I .akc ocuiiiU- fur si\ly-li\o years, and few 
iif ils citi/ciis lia\i' lcinL;i'r witnessed its prDi^rcss and iinprdvement. His 
llic has hccii cliaiaclci i/cd h\- nnliiini; aeii\it\' ;uid perseverance and he is 
well l^iiKwii and hij^iily respcelcd hecaiise nf iiis many sterling traits of 

clinracter. 

OKI \\i>() W Si''K\iS. 

(>ilaiidii \. Ser\ is. a piiiniiiu'iit ami wcilkn.iwn lainier of Section J5, 
Entile Creek low iisliiii. has made 1 .ake county the scene of his (juiet and 
siiccessfnl i-iide,i\i>rs ever since lietiinnin_t;' his active career, and tlie township 
wliere he now resides is also his hirthplace. so that sixty odd _\ears of resi- 
dence h.is made Lake conniy the most paiticiilar and dearest spot of the inhab- 
ited ijlohe to him. The most strenuous p.art of Mr. Servis's Hfe. Iiowever, 
was jiassed aw.iv from ilie peaceful limits of 1 .ake county, in the daily marches 
and h.itllcs i^i the i;real Kehcllion. in which he was one of the faithful soldiers 
of llic I'lnoii .md i;a\c oxer four \cars' of conscientious service for its 
intCL;! ily. 

riiis Nctcr.in soldier and successful farmer was horn in luigle Creek 
township. Lake conniy. Seincmher u, 184,^, heing the sixth of the eight 
children, four sons aiu! four daughters, horn to Orlando \'. and I'diza (hdint) 
Servis, hoth natives oi \ew N'orU state. Iiis father came ti> Lake county 
in llic ihirlies. and l<H'ated on a tract of land near Southeast Grove in Eagle 
I reek township, where he improved aucl developed a line tarni. He died 
al llehrou. in Torter county, when about sevenly-fnc years old. He was 
a prominent meinlKM- of the Methodist Episcopal clnirch, tor some years being 
llic niosi iulUiential supporter of his church, lie was a Whig and Repub- 
lican in politics, and held various local ollices. such as township trustee, etc. 
His wife also died at Hebron at the age of seventy-live. Four of their chil- 
d,reu died when voung. 



200 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Servis Avas reared in his native township, receiving his schooling 
at Southeast Grove. In 1861 he enhsted in Company E. Ninth Indiana 
Infantry, and served two years as private and was then made first duty 
sergeant of his company. At the end of his first term of three years' enHst- 
ment he re-enHsted in the same company and served till the end of the war. 
He participated at the siege of Corinth, at Pittsburg Landing, Stone River 
and Chickamauga, and was with Sherman until wounded at Pine Mountain, 
Georgia, a gunshot wound keeping him in Hospital No. i at Nashville for 
three months, after which he was sent home for thirty days, and rejomed his 
regiment at Pulaski, Tennessee. He was under Thomas at the battles of 
Nashville and Franklin. He had also been wounded at the battle of Resaca, 
a cannon ball passing between his knees and inflicting a severe injury to his 
left knee. In all he served four years and two months, and received his 
honorable discharge at Camp Stanley. Texas, and was mustered out at 
Indianapolis, Indiana. 

On his return from the army he bought the farm of one hundred and 
sixty acres where he now resides, and where he carries on general farming, 
being one of the most progressive and successful men of his class in the 
vicinity. He affiliates with Burnham Post, G. A. R., at Lowell, and is a 
stanch Republican, although he never allows his name to be presented for 
office. He married, in 1870, Miss Nancy A. Pearce, a daughter of Michael 
and Mary J. Pearce, extended mention of which worthy couple will be found 
in the biography of their son, John Pearce. Mr. and Mrs. Servis have one 
child, Mabel, at home, who has completed the eighth grade of the public 
schools and has taken instruction in music. 

FRED J. SMITH. 

Varied and extensive business interests have claimed the attention, en- 
crg\' and business foresight of Fred J. Smith, who is now the senior member 
of the firm of Smith & Bader. real estate and land agents of \\'hiting. He is 
also identified with other financial and commercial interests here, and his 
labors have contributed in no small degree to the upbuilding of the town, for 
the advancement of any community is dependent in large measure upon its 
business men. Mr. Smith is a native son of Indiana, his birth having occurred 
in LaPorte county on the 25th of March, 1S62. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 201 

His father, Louis Smith, was born in Europe, and when a young man 
crossed the Atlantic to the new world. He married Miss Sophia Hider, who 
was also of European birth, but was brought to the new world when but two 
years old. Mr. and Mrs. Louis Smith became residents of LaPorte county, 
Indiana, at an early period in the development of that portion of the state, 
and the subject of this review is their eldest son and second child. He was 
reared under the parental roof and is indebted to the public schools of LaPorte, 
Indiana, for the educational privileges he enjoyed. After putting aside his 
text books he learned the baker's trade and subsequently, in 1890. he cai.ie to 
Whiting, where he became a member of the firm of Smith & Bader as pro- 
prietors of a bakery and restaurant. While in that business they began pur- 
chasing real estate and laid out several additions to the town, the fiist being 
what is known as the Smith & Bader Addition. They afterward laid out the 
Sheridan Park addition, and in this way lia\'e contributed much to the im- 
provement and substantial ui)building of the place. They organized the 
Whiting Land Company, formed under the state laws of Indiana, Mr. Smith 
becoming its president. This company now owns and controls much of the 
best residence property of \\'hiting in the western part of the city. This has 
been greatly improved, involving the investment of one hundred and fifty 
thousand dollars. The first addition has all been sold. Sheridan Park has 
also been improved, some of the best streets of the city ha\-e been laid, there 
and many of the finest residences have been there built. The lots are forty 
feet front, and some of the houses have been erected at a cost of forty-five 
hundred dollars. Mr. Smith has perhaps been more closely identified with 
the upbuilding and improvement of \Miiting than any other man. ami while 
conducting his private business afl'airs he has also contributed in full measure 
to the general welfare. He is one of the directors of the First National Bank 
and is now treasurer of the Petrolene, Paint & Roofing Company of \\'hiting. 
He is continually studying so as to introduce improved methods for the bene- 
fit of the town, and is now president of the Business ]\Ien's Association. 

In 1888 Mr. Smith was united in marriage to ]\Iiss Helen ^laas. and to 
them have been born three sons. Russell. Walter and Lawrence. In his i?(^litical 
views ]\Ir. Smith is a Democrat and was one of the first aldermen of Whiting 
and one of the first trustees of the town after its organization. He has also 
been president of the board of education, and he is a trustee of the Lutheran 



202 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

cluirch, in which he holds membership. He belongs to the little group of 
distinctively representative business men who have been the pioneers m inau- 
gurating and building up the chief industries of this section of the country. 
He early had the sagacity and prescience to discern the eminence which the 
future had in store for this great and growing city, and, acting in accordance 
with the dictates of his faith and judgment, he has garnered in the fulhiess of 
time the generous harvest which is the just recompense of indomitable indus- 
try, spotless integrity and marvelous enterprise. He is now connected with 
many extensive and important business interests. 

ArATHE\\' J. BROWN. 

Mathew J. Brown, who is popularly and extensively known throughout 
Lake and Porter counties as "Matt" Brown, has agricultural, live-stock and 
commercial interests perhaps as important as those of any other man in the 
county of Lake. He resides on section ig of Eagle Creek township, where 
he has one of the beautiful homes of the vicinity. He has spent his life smce 
birth mainly in this township, and has made himself by capacity for business 
transactions and integrity of personal character one of the influential factors 
of industrial and social activity. 

^Ir. Brown was born in Eagle Creek township. October 31. 1857, being 
the third child of William and ^lary J. (Wallace) Brown, whose individual 
history will be found on other pages of this work. He was reared and edu- 
cated in his native township, attending first the country schools and after- 
ward the Northern Lidiana Normal School at Valparaiso. He began his 
career of activity by teaching in the winter and farming in the summer, 
continuing this manner of living until he was twenty-nine years old and 
meanwhile making his home with his father. At that time he took unto 
himself a wife, and then located on a farm about one mile east of his present 
residence. He rented eleven hundred and twenty acres for ten years, and 
carried on very extensive operations in general farming and stock-raising. At 
the same time he liought and sold much land, his transactions involving over 
two thousand acres altogether. At one time in his career he was engaged 
in farming two thousand acres. In 1900 he built his present residence at a 
cost of about eight thousand dollars, it being one of the model country homes 
of Lake countv. He owns about a thousand acres, not a foot of which does 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 2C3 

he rent out tn other parties. He pays out thousands of dollars for help and 
carries on all his extensive operations under his own direct supervision. He 
also has an extensive mercantile husiness at Hebron, in Porter county, and at 
one time he was a merchant of Lowell. He has a general store of his own 
at Hebron and also a half interest in a store with his brother. He has spent 
nearly all of the years of his active career in the hay and grain and live-stock 
business, and in fact will deal in nearly everything subject to barter, e.Kchange 
or purchase. He is also senior member of the Hebron Lumber and Coal 
Company, which has extensive trade in its lines. ]Mr. Brown, on his farm, 
makes a specialty of raising fine Hereford cattle, and keeps about one hun- 
dred head of this beautiful stock. He has been highly prospered in all his 
enterprises, and for about twenty years has been recognized as one of the 
men of power and ability in trade and agricultural circles of eastern Lake 
countv. Besides the multifarious duties and business interests of j\lr. Brown, 
we may add that he has been extensively engaged as a tb.resher for twenty- 
five years in Eagle Creek and adjacent territory, and has met with 'lis usual 
degree of success. He introduced the first steam thresher in Eagle Creek 
township and even at the present time (1904) has two or three outfits 
at work. 

He has been a stanch Repulilican since casting his first presidential 
ballot, and has not been content to sit idle while others performed the duties 
of citizenship. He was elected to the office of county commissioner in 1902, 
and is the nominee for a second term. He was serxing as township trustee 
just before election to his present office. He is a member of the Masonic 
order at Hebron, Lodge No. 502, and also of the Ivnights of Pythias, Lodge 
No. 405. at the same place. 

March 31, 1886, Mr. Brown married Aliss ^lary A. Crawford, who was 
born in Eagle Creek township of Lake county, being a daughter of John 
and Adaline (Staley) Crawford. She was educated in the home schools 
and at the Female Seminary at Oxford, Ohio. There were eight children 
born of this union : Joseph E., who is attending the Crown Point high school; 
Harry also in the Crown Point high school; \\'illiam Jay. John Crawford, 
Rubv A., Kenneth D., Bessie and Marv H. 



204 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

D. H. THOMPSON. 

D. H. Thompson, of section 26, Center township, has been a prominent 
Lake county farmer for the past t\venty-fi\e years, lias done his share in the 
work of progress and development of tlie county's material, social", intehectual 
and moral affairs, and in all the relations of a very busy and successful life 
has been found true to his best ideals and lias retained the confidence and 
esteem of his fellow citizens. 

Mr. Thompson was born in fiercer countv, Pennsylvania, August 4, 
1846. His father, Anthony Thompson, was a native of Ireland, but his grand- 
parents were born in .Scotland. He came over to America when seventeen 
years old and followed the occupation of farming in Pennsylvania during the 
rest of his life. He was married in the same state to Reljecca McClure, whose 
father v.'as one of the first school teachers in western Pennsylvania. She died 
at the age of sixty-seven, having been the mother of twelve children, of whom 
D. H. is the youngest, and his oldest brother is still living in Lawrence 
count}'. Pennsylvania, past the age of eighty. 

]\Ir. D. H. Thompson was reared in his native county, and obtained his 
early literary training in the country schools, completing his education in the 
Iron City School at Pittsburg. In 1863, when seventeen years old, he enlisted 
in Company D, Fifty-fifth Pennsylvania Militia, and served as a private for 
sixty days during the invasion of the southern forces into the state. He then 
returned home and fur a number of years followed the occupations of farm- 
ing, carpentering and bridge-building in Pennsylvania. In i\Iarcli, 1879, he 
came out to Lake county, Indiana, and entered upon his career as farmer in 
Center township. He has a fine farm of one liundred and sixty acres, and its 
well improved and highly cultivated acres are valuable in themselves and 
return large profits from their skilful culture under the direction of Mr. 
Thoni])son. 

He is a firm adherent of the Republican party in matters of national 
inipiirtance, Imt pays little attention to the party tag aflixed to the candidate 
for local office. He is a member of the United Presbyterian cliurch and is 
serving as treasurer of the same. 

March 25, 1879, Mr. Thompson married ]\liss Margaret A. McKnight, 
who was born December 11, 1847. '" Porter county. Indiana, near the Lake 




M), %. cCl»^. 



^^^<?^ 




XX) 



^-A-V-x-i , 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 205 

county line, and was reared for the most part in Lake county. She liad four 
brothers in the war of the Rebellion, one of whom was killed at the battle of 
Kenesaw Mountain and another died in the hospital. Mr. Thompson also 
had a brother John, who served in the Seventh Kansas Regiment during the 
war. Mr. and Mrs. Thompson have three children living; Samuel A., James 
\\'. and \\"illiam R. Samuel resides with his parents and is an agriculturist. 
James W'., at Charlottsville, Indiana, and a telegrapher on the Pan Handle 
Railroad, was educated in the normal college at Valparaiso. William R., the 
youngest, is at home. 

]Mrs. Thompson's parents are both deceased : her lather died aged eighty- 
three, and mother about seventy-five. They were members of the Reformed 
Presbyterian church. Mrs. Thompson is a memlier of the L'niteil Pres- 
byterian church. Mr. and Mrs. Thompson are citizens who are held in high 

esteem. 

\V.\LTER L. ALLi\L\N. 

Walter L. Allman, vice-president of the Commercial Bank and senior 
partner of the abstract firm of Allman Brothers, figures prominently in busi- 
ness circles in Crown Point, and whde his life history contains no exciting 
chapters it yet demonstrates the force of consecutive endeavor, guided by 
sound business principles and supiilemented liy laudable aml)ition. 

Mr. Allman is a native son of Crown Point, where his birth occurred 
on the 6th of October. 1861. He is the eldest son of Amos and Mary A. 
(Luther) Allman, and is of English lineage. His grandfather, Major 
Allman. was the first Methodist minister at Crown Point and was closely 
identified with the early de\'elo])ment and moral advancement of the county. 
The name of Allman has since been closeh' associated with the history of 
Lake county, and its various representati\'es ha\'e been worthy and valuable 
citizens. Amos Allman was but an infant wdien brought to the county and 
he spent almost his entire life here. For a long period he was engaged in 
the abstract business. 

In taking up the personal history of \\'alter L. Allman we present to 
our readers the life record of one who is widely and favorably known in 
Lake county, where his business activity has led to success and prominence. 
He has always lived in Lake county with the exception of about a year spent 
with his parents in Niles, Michigan. The greater part of his education was 



206 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

obtained in the select school taught by the Misses Knight. At the age of 
eleven years he began to learn the trade of typesetting in the office of the 
Crown Point Herald, and devoted about two years to that occupation. When 
about fifteen years of age he entered his father's abstract business, and when 
twenty-one years of age he was admitted to a partnership. Upon his father's 
death he became the senior partner in the business, in which he is associated 
with his brother, and they have a good clientage in this regard. Walter L. 
Allman also became cashier of the Commercial Bank of Crown Point upon 
its organization in 1895 and served in that capacity until 1904, when he was 
elected vice-president of said bank. He is therefore well known in financial 
circles, and his business ability and executive force have contributed in large 
measure to the successful conduct of the l)ank, which has become recognized 
as one of the strong, safe and relialile financial institutions of the county. 

Mr. Allman has been married twice. In 1892 he wedded Miss Arvilla 
E. Sings, who died in 1894, and in 1900 he was again married, his second 
union being with Miss Eva Dyer, a daughter of Thomas Henry and Alta 
(Smith) Dyer, of Kankakee, Illinois. Mrs. .\llman was Ixirn in Kankakee 
county, Illinois, but acquired her ijreliminary education in the public: schools 
of Crown Point and was graduated in the Chicago Female College, at 
Morgan Park, Illinois. She afterward engaged in teaching school for several 
years, and is a lady of superior culture and refinement, presiding with gracious 
hospitality over her pleasant home, which has been blessed w'ith one son, 
Amos Dyer, born April 8, 1901. 

In his fraternal relations Mr. Allman is a Knight of Pythias, and politi- 
cally is a Republican who keeps well informed on the questions and issues 
of the day and gives earnest support to the principles and candidates of the 
partv. His life history is as an open book to his fellow-townsmen, who 
have had intimate knowledge of his career from his early lx)yhood. His 
has been an honorable career, in which he has been active in business, loyal in 
citizenship, faithful in friendship, and as a representative of one of the most 
prominent pioneer families of the county and as a business man whose record 
will l)ear the closest investigation, he well deserves mention in this volume. 

HUGH F. MEIKLE. 

Hush F. Meikle, dealer in coal, brick, wood, lime and cement, at Ham- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 207 

niond. has been well known in the business circles of this city for the past 
seven or eight years, and for the past fi\-e years has been established in his 
present business, which he conducts with satisfactory success, and with such 
fair and square dealing and enterprise that he enjoys a good patronage. He 
is a man of proved ability, having been a salesman and in business for him- 
self for a number of years, and has long since found his proper sphere of 
usefulness in the world. 

He was born in Louisville, Kentucky, October 17, 1863, being now 
the only survivor of two sons and one daughter born to Thomas and Mar- 
garet (Fulton) Meikle, both natives of Scotland. Mr. Meikle's forefathers 
have resided for generations in Scotland. His great-grandparents were 
James and Elizabeth Meikle. His grandfather, also James Meikle, was a 
contractor of Scotland and was also ma}'or of Muir Kirk. He died in 
Scotland when about seventy-two years old, and his wife. Mary (Brown) 
]\Ieikle. was also past seventy at the time of her death. They had a large 
family of children. 

Thomas Meikle was a blacksmith, learning the trade in his native 
country. He came to America about 1858. locating in Louisville, Kentuckv. 
where he began the manufacture of agricultural implements. He died in 
Chicago while on a visit to his son Hugh F., in 1897, at the age of seventy. 
He and his wife were Presbyterians, and the latter still survives, making her 
home in Louisville. She was one of a large family of children born to Hugh 
and Agnes (Stuart) Fulton, both natives of Scotland, and the former a 
shoe merchant of Kilmarnock. Hugh Fulton was eighty-four years old 
when he died, anrl his wife lived to the patriarchal age of ninety-six, so it 
seems that all branches of the family have been very long-lived and endowed 
with Scotch hardihood and strength. 

Hugh F. Meikle was reared in Louisville. He liad a good public school 
course, graduating from the high school in 1880. He then began work in 
his father's plow factory and afterward was advanced to the superintendency 
of the factory. He held this position until 1888. and from then until 1896 
was on the road as a plow expert. He was called to Hammond in the latter 
year in order to install the machinery for what was known as the Chicago 
Ax Company's plant. After that was accomplished he was on the road for 
eighteen months longer, and in May, 1899, engaged in the wood and coal 



208 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

business in Hammond, which enterprise lie lias continued, with enlarged facil- 
ities, to the present time. 

July 22, 1885, Mr. Meikle married Miss Emma E. Korb. a daughter of 
Jacob and Caroline (Steinage) Korb. Two daughters have been born of 
this marriage, Agnes and Eunice. Mr. Meilcle is a member of the Presby- 
terian church, and is also a Mason of high standing. He is master of Gar- 
field Lodge No. 569, F. & A. M., and a member of Hammond Chapter No. 
117, R. A. M., and Hammond Commandery No 41, K. T. He also has 
fraternal membership with the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. 
In politics he is a Republican. He is prominent and well known in the 
business and social circles of his city. He was elected president of the 
Hammond school board, February 26, 1904. 

JERRY M. KENNEY. 

For eighty-one years Jerry M. Kenney has traveled life's journey, and 
through a long- period has been a resident of Lake county. He came here 
when this was a pioneer section, the work of progress and improvement hav- 
ing been scarcely begun, and through the intervening years he has watched 
with interest the advancement that has here been made and has given his 
co-operation to many mo\-ements for the public good. He is a native of the 
Pine Tree state, his birth having occurred in the town of Hollowell. Kennebec 
county, IMaine, on the loth of November, 1823. 

The family is of Scotch lineage and was founded in America in colonial 
days. Charles Kenney, the father of our subject, was a native of Maine and 
was there reared and married. By occupation he was a luniberman in early 
life. In 1807 he removed to Ohio, where he remained for three years, and 
then returned to Maine, where he continued to reside until 1837, when he came 
to Lake county, Indiana, establishing liis home in Eagle Creek township. He 
cast in his lot with its early settlers and bore his full share in the work of 
reclaiming the wild land for the purposes of civilization. There he made his 
home throughout his remaining days, passing away at the age of sixty-six 
years. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Deborah Rollins, was also a 
native of Maine and died in Lake county, Indiana, when more than seventy 
years of age, To this worthy couple were born four sons and a daughter, all 
of whom reached adult age, but Mr. Kenney, who was the fourth child, is now 
the only one living. 




(?/juey3^ ^n^yi^c€^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 209 

Jerry M. Kenney spent the first fourteen years of his hfe in the state of 
liis nativity and then accompanied his parents on their removal to Lake county, 
Indiana. He had previously attended the pubhc schools of Maine and after 
coming to this state he assisted in opening' up a new farm, the family being 
the first to settle on the prairie in Eagle Creek township. He performed much of 
the arduous tasks incident to the development of a new farm, and to his father 
gave the benefit of his services until twenty-one years of age. He then went 
to Door Prairie, where he worked for two years as a farm hand at ten dollars 
per month. On the expiration of that period he rented land of his father for 
two years, and then with the capital which he had acquired through his own 
energy, perseverance and economy he purchased eighty acres of land and began 
its improvement. He broke the sod, planted crops, set out an orchartl and 
made other substantial improvements until his highly cultivated farm bore 
little resemblance to the wild tract which had come into his possession. He 
added to his land from time to time until he is now the owner of about five 
hundred acres, and he \\as successfully engaged in general farming until 
1854, when he purchased a store at what is called Orchard Grove. There he 
carried on general merchandising for twenty-seven years in connection with 
agricultural pursuits. In 1900 he sold his store and retired from business, 
to enjoy a rest which he had truly earned and richly deserves. 

In 1848 was celebrated the marriage of Mr. Kenney and Miss Phoebe 
Woodruff, a native of Ohio, who was brought to Lake county by her parents 
when a maiden of ten years, the family being early settlers of this portion of 
the state. They became the parents of six children, four sons and two daugh- 
ters : George W., Lucinda, J. C, Joseph D., Schuyler C. and Effie L. All 
were born in Lake county and are yet living, with the exception of Joseph D. 
Kenney. 

In early life Mr. Kenney was a stanch advocate of Whig principles and 
at the dissolution of that party he became a stalwart Republican, and has since 
voted the ticket of that party organization, where state and national ques- 
tions are involved. At local elections, however, he votes independently, sup- 
porting the candidate whom he thinks best qualified for office. He served for 
twenty-seven consecutive years as postmaster at Orchard Grove, and he has 
been a member of the Methodist Episcopal church since twenty-five years of 
age, while his wife united with the same denomination at the age of sixteen. 
11 



210 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

They have taken a \evy active and lielpful part in church work, and Mr. 
Kenney has served as class leader and as Sunday-school superintendent. As 
one of the pioneers of the county he has witnessed its development from an 
early day and has borne his full share in the work of progress and improve- 
ment. At the same time he has carved out a fortune for himself. He started 
out in life empty-handed, but he possessed strong determination and by his 
imfaltering lator and honorable dealing he has gained a handsome property 
and is justly accounted one of the self-made men of Lake county. 

Mrs. Kenney was born June 26, 1830, and she was educated in the com- 
m.on schools. For fifty-six years or over a half century have Mr. and Mrs. 
Kenney traveled the journey of life, sharing alike the joys and sorrows. She 
is the onlv survivor of the Woodruff family. Mr. and Mrs. Kenney attended 
the pioneer school of the early day when the window was of greased paper, 
and the house was heated by the old-fashioned fireplace. The roof was of 
"shakes." He has swung the old-fashioned cradle in the harvest field many 
a day. Mr. Kenney's grandfathers were lioth in the Revolutionary war and 
figured in different battles, and Mr. Kenney's grandfather's wife was killed 
by the Indians when in a block house, through the port hole : this was in the 
war of 1S12. 

?\Ir. and ]Mrs. Kenney have one of the old deeds which was executed 
April 10, 1843, '^''"^1 signed by President John Tyler, the eighth deed of the 
kind found in Lake county. They have three other of these documents dated 
June 25, 1 841, and April 10, 1843, by President Tyler, and another dated 
April 10, 1848, and signed by President James K. Polk, — four of tliesc deeds 
in this one household. It was as late as 1848 when Mr. Kenney's father went 
to Wabash, Indiana, to get supplies, such as meat and flour, and took two 
four-horse teams. He has seen Chicago when most all of the business was 
done on Lake street and the ox teams were turned loose in Lhe common. 

Mr. Kenney has always taken an active part in the old settlers' meeting, 
at Crown Point. When he first knew Lake county there was not a railroad 
in the entire county, where now fourteen or fifteen great trunk lines cross the 
county. The first railroad built in the county was the ^Michigan Central. 
Mr. and Mrs. Kenney have seen many of the Indians in their vicinity, and 
Mr. Kenney says he has played with the Indians, and at one time thei^e were 
about five hundred camped near Shelby, in Cedar Creek township. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 211 

LEVI HUTTON. 

Levi Hutton, a prominent and successful farmer of Winfielcl township, 
is a business man and agriculturist of broad experience and training, and has 
done well at A-arious occupations in the course of his fifty-eight years of life. 
He began early to achieve a place in the world, and from early years spent 
in an industrial establishment of the east he later branched out into farming 
and commercial pursuits in the middle west. He is held in high esteem 
throughout A\'infield townshi]) and Lake county, and is reliable and sub- 
stantial in all his dealings. 

Mr. Hutton was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the part of the 
city now known as Fairmount Park, on July 26, 1846. His father, also 
named Levi, was born in Delaware, and began his career to success bv work- 
ing as a driver on the Susequehanna canal, and also acted as cook on a passen- 
ger boat. He afterward worked in a mill m Philadelphia, and finally began 
the manufacture of carpets. He is supposed to have been the first man to suc- 
ceed in making a shoddy ingrain carpet. He was in the carpet manufactur- 
ing business at Philadelphia for some time, and then engaged in the same 
line and also in farming in Maryland, and in 1861 returned to Philadelphia, 
where he was superintendent of a woolen factory for four years. In March, 
1865. he moved out to Lake county, Indiana, and began fanifing near Hobart, 
where he remained until his death, in March, 1872, at the age of forty-five. 
His wife was Maria Lord, a native of England. Init who was reared in 
America, coming to this country at the age of seven years. She died in Lake 
county at the age of forty-five. She was of a Quaker family. She and her 
husband had six children that grew up, their son Levi being the eldest. 

Mr. Levi Hutton was reared and educated in Philadelphia for the most 
part, and in 1865 came out to Lake county, where he remained with his 
parents until he was of age. He then returned to Philadelphia and became 
foreman in a bobbin room of a cotton factory, in the "Good Intent ?>Iills." 
He had begun in this factory at an early age, at wages of six dollars a week, 
and had steadily advanced to a foremanship in another department, learning 
every detail of the business. He was receiving a salary of eighty-five dollars 
a month when he left. On his return to Lake county he began farming near 
Hobart, but in 1871 sold out and went to Chicago, where he was employed as 



212 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

a helper in the carpenter trade. At his father's death he returned to Hobart 
and was appointed administrator to settle up the estate, after the completion 
of which task he returned to Chicago and engaged in the saloon business, 
continuing it for eight months. His next enterprise was the buying of milch 
cows and disposing of them in Chicago, being thus engaged for two years. 
He then rented a farm near Hobart for two years, and in 1877 bought a small 
farm in Winfield township. In 1886 he bought the farm of one hundred and 
eighty acres where he still resides, and all the fine improvements and excellent 
features of this farmstead are the result of Mr. Hutton's own industry and 
management. From 1894 to 1901 he was engaged in the grocery business 
at East Chicago, in partnership witli \Y. R. Diamond, and their monthly 
sales ran up to a high figure. 

Mr. Hutton is one of the influential Repuljlicans of his township, and is 
the present nominee for the trusteeship of \Vinfield township. He has served 
as road supervisor of this township. He was treasurer of the East Chicago 
Republican committee, and has been delegate to various Republican conven- 
tions. 

Mr. Hutton married, in 1868, Miss Gertrude R. Fieler, a daughter of 
Jacob and Catherine (Schrage) Fieler. She was born in Germany and came 
to America when seven 3'ears old. Her brother, Christian Fieler, is sketched 
elsewhere in this work. Mr. and Mrs. Hutton lost three children in child- 
hood, and the three living are : Ida C, wife of L. A. Phillips, of Porter 
county, Indiana ; Lydia M., wife of Albert Lewis, of East Chicago ; and 

Tames P., at home. 

WALTER H. HAMMOND. 

\\'alter H. Hammond, who is one of the prominent real estate an 1 insur- 
ance men of Hammond, has spent almost his entire life in this city, and has 
for several years been accounted one of its most progressive and enlightened 
business men. He is a son of one of the pioneers of this city, and is con- 
nected with the family which gave Hammond its name and its greatest in- 
dustry. 

Mr, Hammond was born in Detroit, Michigan, October 26, 1873, being 
a son of Thomas and Helen (Potter) Hammond, natives of Massachusetts. 
His paternal grandfather was a native of Massachusetts, of English descent, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 213 

and had a large family. His maternal grandfather was a nati\'e of the same 
state. Thomas Hammond was a carpenter by trade, and followed that pnr- 
suit in the east. He came to Detroit, Michigan, when a yonng man, and was 
engaged in the meat business there until 1875, '" which year he came to 
Hammond, Indiana, and became connected with George H. Hammond 
& Company. This well-known packing company at the beginning employed. 
a force of about fifty men, but later increased it to nearly two thousand. The 
business was carried on in Hammond until May, 1903, when it was moved 
to Chicago. Thomas Hammond is now president or the Commercial Bank 
of Hammond, and is also engaged in the real estate Inisiness. He was con- 
gressman from this district for one term dinging the Cle\-eland reginicn, and 
also served as mayor of Hammond for six years and as alderman for four 
years. He was originally a Methodist, and his wife is a Baptist. They had 
five children, two sons and three daughters: Elizabeth E., deceased; Carrie, 
wife of W. A. Hill, of Hammond; \A''alter H. ; Frank; and Edith. 

Mr. Walter H. Hammond was about four years old A\hen he came to 
Hammond, and has lived here the rest of his life. He graduated from the 
high school in 1892, after which he attended Oberlin College. He then took 
a business course in the Metropolitan Business College in Chicago, and 
shortly afterward engaged in the real estate and insurance Ijgsiness. which 
he has continued with increasing success to the present time. He is president 
of the Home Building and Loan and Savings ^Association of Lake county, 
and is the owner of considerable city property in addition t(^ his nice resi- 
dence at 704 South Hohman street, wdiich he built in 1902. 

June 17, 1896, Mr. Hammond married Miss Miami J. Laws, a daughter 
of John and Eliza Laws. They have three children, Harold W., Florence E. 
and Kenneth H. Mr. and Mrs. Hammond are members of the First Baptist 
church, and he is a church trustee. He affiliates with Garfield Lodge No. 569, 
F. & A. ]M., with Hammond Cha]5ter No. 117, R. A. M., and with Hamninnd 
Commandery. K. T. In politic^ h.e is a Democrat. 

HERBERT S. BARR. 

The true measure of success is determined liy what one has accom- 
plished, and, as taken in ciintradistinction to the old adage that a prophet is 
not without honor save in his o\\n cnuntry, th.ere is pai'licnlar interest 



214 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

attaching to the career of the subject of this review, since he is a native son 
of the place where he has passed his acti\-e life, and has so directed his ability 
and efforts as to gain recognition as one of the representative citizens of Lake 
county. He is actively connected with a profession which has important 
bearing upon the progress and stable prosperity of any section or community, 
and one which has long been considered as conserving the public welfare by 
furthering the ends of justice and maintaining individual rights. 

Mr. Barr was born in Crown Point, March 4, 1865. His paternal grand- 
father w-as Samuel Barr and his father S. A. Barr. The latter, a native of 
Pennsylvania, came to Lake county in 1866, was prominent and influential 
in public afifairs and was widely recognized as one of the leading, honored 
and respected citizens of his community. He served his country as a soldier 
of the Civil war and was wounded at the Isattle of Peach Tree Creek by a 
minie ball, and the injury that he there sustained caused his death thirty- 
four years later. In politics he was a stanch Democrat and filled the oitice 
of county auditor for four years. He was likewise a worthy representative 
of the Masonic fraternity and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and 
in all life's relations was found true and loyal to every trust reposed in him 
and to high ideals. He married Miss Emma Standish, a direct descendant of 
Miles Standish. 'Mr. S. A. Barr passed away in 1898. but his widow stil! 
survives. They were the parents of five children, all of whom are yet living. 

Mr. H. S. Barr was the second child of the family, and in his early 
youth attended the public schools of Crown Point. He afterward became a 
student in the Northwestern Law School, and his reading for his profession 
was also directed by J. \\'. Youche for several years. Later he was asso- 
ciated in practice with IMr. Youche for about seven years, and since 1893 he 
has been successfully prosecuting his profession at Crown Point. He lived 
for about one year in Chicago, but with this exception has remained continu- 
ously in his native city, where he is now numliered among the leading law- 
yers. 

In 1899 was celebrated the marriage of Mr. Barr and ]\Iiss Jessie Hill, a 
daughter of Charles J. Hill, and they h.a\-e two children, Harold and Ruth. 
Mr. Barr affiliates with the ]\Iasonic fraternity and the Independent Order of 
Foresters, and in politics is a supporter of Democratic principles. His life 
has been one of untiring activitv crowned with success, vet he is not less 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 215 

esteemed as a citizen than as a la\v}-er, and his kindly impulses and charm- 
ing cordiality of manner have rendered him exceedingly popular among all 

classes. 

LA\\'RENCE COX. 

Lawrence Cox, superintendent of the Tdetropolitan police of Hammond, 
has been connected with the public life and business interests and as a private 
citizen of Hammond for over fifteen years, and there is perhaps no better 
know'n resident of the city nor any more interested in the welfare and gen- 
eral development of both city and county. He has been in some important 
official position for the past seven years, and has been found efficient, ener- 
getic and painstaking in all his performances. 

^Ir. Cox was born in the province of Ontario, Canada, near Kingston, 
June i6, 1866, a son of John and Mary (Kane) Cox, both natives of Canada. 
His paternal grandfather was the founder of the family in America. He 
was born in Ireland, and about the beginning of the nineteenth century he 
and his wife Isabella emigrated to Canada, and their four daughters and one 
son were all born on this side of the waters. 

John Cox has been a life-long and prominent farmer of Canada, and 
now resides on Howe Island, in Ontario. He has been prominent in the 
public affairs of his community, being now county commissioner of Fron- 
tenac county. He was reeve of his township for a number of years, nnd was 
fishery overseer for some years under Sir John McDonald. He is a member 
of the Catholic church, as was also his wife. She died in 1894, at the age 
of fifty-one years. Her father was Thomas Kane, a native of county Water- 
ford, Ireland, and who emigrated to Canada about 1836, settling on Howe 
Island, where he was a farmer. His wife was Catharine (Powers) Kane, 
and they had a family of twelve children. 

John and Mary Cox had thirteen children in their family, and nine are 
still living, as follows : Kate, the wife of \V. J. Collins, of Hillsville, Penn- 
sylvania : Lawrence, of Hammond: Maggie, the wife of R. J. Patterson, of 
Danville, Connecticut; ^latthew J., of Ontario, Canada; Miss Marian, a 
teacher of Howe Island. Ontario ; John, of Scranton, Pennsyhania : Miss 
Lillian, of ^Montreal, Quebec; Agnes, the wife of William Beaubien, of 
Howe Island ; and \'incent, of Hillsville, Pennsvlvania. 



216 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

IMr. Lawrence Cox was reared on his father's farm to the age of four- 
teen years. He received his education in the district schools, the Kingston 
Collegiate Institute, and also in the night school of the Dominion Business 
College at Kingston. He was a bookkeeper for a time, and in 1884 made a 
trip to the Lhiited States. In 188S he came to Hammond as his permanent 
location. He was first emplo}-ed with the G. H. Hammond & Company for 
two years, and from 1891 to February, 1897, was in the fire and life insur- 
ance business. At the latter date he became deputy sheriff under B. F. 
Hayes, and then held the same position under the latter's successor until May 
I, 1901, which was the date of his appointment to the ofifice of superintendent 
of the Metropolitan police, which ofiice he has filled to the eminent .-.atisfac- 
tion of all concerned for the past three vears. 

Aug-ust 8, 1899, ^Ir. Cox married Mrs. Mary Nelson, the widow of 
R. H. Nelson and a daughter of William W. Reece and Anna E. (Dowdi- 
gan) Reece. Her parents were pioneers of the Calumet river region, and 
for many years were the only residents between the Indiana state line and 
South Chicago. Mrs. Cox is their only child, and her father died when she 
was about three years old, but her mother still lives and makes her home 
with Mrs. Cox. She has considerable propertv interests in Chicago. Mrs. 
Cox had two children by her former marriage, Alfaretta and Mae. Mr. and 
Mrs. Cox are members of the Catholic church, and he afiiliates with the 
Knights of Pythias and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and is 
also a charter member of the Hammond Club. His politics are Republican. 
He owns his nice home at 517 South Hohman street, and he and his wife 
have hosts of friends in the city and vicinity. 

CALLUS J. BADER. 

Gallus J. Bader, prominent as a representative of tlie business and finan- 
cial interests of Whiting, is now the president of the First National Bank at 
tliat place. A man of great natural ability, his success in business from the 
beginning of his residence in ^^'hiting has been uniform and rapid. As has 
been truly remarked, after all that may be done for a man in the way of giving 
him early opportunities for obtaining the advantages which are found in the 
schools and in books, he must essentially formulate, determine and give shape 
to his own character, and this is what Mr. Bader has done. He has perse- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 217 

vered in the pursuit of a persistent purpose and has gained the most satisfac- 
tory reward, and his name is a strong one on commercial paper and an honored 
one in all business transactions. 

Mr. Bader was born in LaPorte, Indiana, on the 2d of November, 1864, 
and is a son of Callus J. and Magdalene (Mantel) Bader, both of whom were 
natives of Baden, Germany, whence they emigrated to America, settling in 
LaPorte county, Indiana, at an early period in the development and upbuild- 
ing of this portion of the state. The father was engaged in the hotel business 
and conducted what was called the Washington House. 

Callus J. Bader. his namesake and the immediate subject of this review, 
is the voungest in a family of six children, all of whom reached adult age. 
His education was acquired in the public schools of LaPorte, and his boyhood 
days were spent under the parental roof. At the age of twenty-one years he 
began business as a dry-goods merchant of LaPorte, where he continued until 
1890, when he came to Whiting and entered into partnership with Fred J. 
Smith in the conduct of a bakery and restaurant. Subsequently he turned his 
attention to the electric light business, and in this enterprise was associated 
with James A. Gill. They organized a company and erected a plant, of which 
Mr. Gill was the president, while Air. Bader was the secretary and treasurer. 
This enterprise prospered and enabled him at a later date to extend hi^ labors 
into financial circles. The First National Bank of Whiting was organized on 
the 1st of December, 1902, and capitalized for fifty thousand dollars. Mr. 
Bader is now president, while John M. Thiele is the cashier and W. E. War- 
wick is vice-president. These gentlemen are members of the board of di- 
rectors together with James A. Gill, Richard F. Schaaf and Frank H. Morri- 
son, the last named of LaPorte, and F. J. Smith, of Whiting. 

In 1893 occurred the marriage of Callus J. Bader and Miss Elizabeth 
Wagner, who was born in 1870 and was reared in Michigan City, LaPorte 
county. This marriage has been blessed with one child, a son, Clarence. 
Both Mr. and Mrs. Bader are well known in Whiting and this portion of 
Indiana, and have gained many warm friends who entertain for them high 
regard and extend to them the hospitality of the best homes of Whiting. 

In his political views Mr. Bader is a Republican, having joined the ranks 
of the party in 1896 on account of the money question. He had formerly 
supported the Democracy, but could not endorse the "free and unlimited 



218 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

coinage of silver at the ratio of i6 to i." Fraternally he is connected with the 
Knights of Columbus. He has been a ver\' successful business man and one 
whose life history should serve as a source of encouragement and inspiration 
to others, showing what may be accomplished by determined purpose and 
capable management. He began with a very small amount of money. His 
father died when the son was but thirteen years of age, and from that time 
forward the boy had to depend upon his own resources for a living. He 
entered upon his business career as a salesman in a dry-goods store, and in 
order to perfect his education attended night school for two winter seasons. 
He remained for two years in the employ of the man whose service he had 
first entered, and then went to Chicago, where he became an employe of the 
Crane Elevator Company, continuing for three years in the machinist depart- 
ment. He then returned to LaPorte and engaged in business for himself, 
and for five years he was numbered among the merchants of that place. On 
the expiration of that period he sold his business there in order to remove to 
Whiting, where he has since been located and where he has made for himself 
an honored name, gaining at the same time a very creditable success. 

Since 1900, the firm of Smith & Bader have been engaged extensively in 
the real estate business, after having been in the bakery business for ten years. 

Mr. Bader possesses untiring energy, is quick of perception, forms his 
plans readily and is determined in their execution, and his close application to 
business and his excellent management have brought to him the high degree 
of prosperity which is to-day his. He thoroughly enjoys home life and takes 
great pleasure in the midst of his family and friends, to whom he is always 
courteous, kindly and affable, and those who know him personally entertain 
for him warm regard. 

MARION F. PIERCE. 

Marion F. Pierce, merchant and well-known business man of Alerrill- 
ville, Ross township, is one of the oldest native sons of Lake county still 
engaged in the active pursuits of life. Three generations of the Pierce 
family have been identified with the industrial and commercial affairs of the 
county, covering a period of seventy years, and extending from the time 
when the alternate stretches of woodland and prairie in Lake county offered 
habitation to few white men, until now there is not a square foot anywhere 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 219 

not in private possession or devoted to public use. ]\Iyiel Pierce, the grand- 
fatlier; Marion Pierce, the father: and Floyd AI. Pierce, the son, are the three 
men wlio have wrought out tlieir success and advanced the welfare of the 
county during the years of their lives spent here, and to the second of the 
three is due the distinction of sixty-three years of residence in the township 
where his business interests are still located. 

Mr. M. F. Pierce was born in Ross township. Lake county, August i, 
1841. His father, Myiel Pierce, was born about 1800 in Erie county, New 
York, and as a pioneer among the pioneers arrived in Lake county, Indiana, 
June 25, 1835. He was a farmer and hotel-keeper and in September, 1842, 
erected the old and well-known Mcrrillville Hotel, which after sixty-two 
years of use still stands as a monument to its founder and builder. He sold 
this hotel property after running it two years, and then bought the farm on 
which he died in 1847. He was county assessor for a time, and was well 
known throughout the surrounding country. His wife was Marcia Ann 
Crawford, a native of Erie county. New York, and who died in January, 
1897. in her seventy-eighth year. There were six children in their family: 
Corydon, Angelina, Sidney, Marion F., ]\Iyiel, and Myron, who died about 
1848. 

Clarion F. Pierce was about six years old when his father died, and 
he never enjoyed many days of pleasant boyish recreation, nor yet had he his 
full complement of schooling. His mother was compelled to go into the 
hayfield and do a man's labor in order to maintain her family and home, 
and Marion was never behindhand in assisting her, and in each succeeding 
year did a larger share of the farm duties. He thus remained on the home 
farm until he was twenty-one, and on .-\ugust 9, 1862, enlisted in Company 
A, Ninety-ninth Indiana Infantry, serving in the ranks for nearly three 
years, until his discharge after the close of the war, on June 16, 1865. He 
was in thirty battles altogether, taking part at Vicksburg, Jackson, Resaca, 
Lookout Mountain, Atlanta, Jonesboro, Fort McAllister, was all through 
the campaign to the sea, and thence to Washington, where he participated 
in the grand review. He returned to Ross township and resumed farm work, 
remaining at home till his marriage, in 1867. In 1873 he engaged in the 
mercantile business at Merrillville, and has been in that for over twenty years, 
now ranking as the premier merchant and business man of the town. 



220 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Pierce is one of the influential Democrats of the county, and has 
taken an active part in local affairs. He was trustee of Ross township for 
nine years, served as postmaster of Merrillville four years, and was in the 
internal revenue service five years under Cleveland's administration. He 
affiliates with the John Wheeler Post, G. A. R., at Crown Point, and in the 
Masonic Lodge No. 551, at Merrillville, has filled all the chairs but one, 
senior deacon. 

He was married, October 27, 1867, to Miss Maggie B. Randolph, 
daughter of Cyrus and Allie (Meade) Randolph. They are the parents of 
three children: Floyd M., Cora B. and Ralph M. 

JOHN FISHER. 

John Fisher, now deceased, was a respected and honored resident of 
Crown Point, who had many friends in Lake county, and whose death, there- 
fore, was deeply regretted. He was born in Schenectady county, Nev,' York, 
September 7, 1832. and was of Scotch parentage and ancestry. His father, 
Alexander Fisher, was born in Ayr, Scotland, and in 1818 crossed the At- 
lantic to the new world, settling first in Montreal, Canada. The following 
year, however, he removed to Schenectady, New York, where he spent his 
remaining days. He was a millwright and farmer, following the dual pur- 
suits as a life work. 

In his native county John Fisher was reared, spending his boyhood days 
under the parental roof, where he was trained to habits of industry and 
economy. The west, with its business possibilities, attracted him, and in 1855 
he came to Lake county, Indiana, locating at Southeast Grove in Eagle Creek 
township. There he was engaged in the broom manufacturing business and 
soon after his arrival in Lake coun.tv he was elected county surveyor, which 
position he filled for many years. He knew every foot of the county, his 
business making him thoroughly familiar with every locality. It also brought 
to him a wide acquaintance, and he became one of the most prominent and 
influential men in this part of the state, taking an active and helpful interest 
in public affairs. He was one of the civil engineers who worked on the con- 
struction of the Panhandle Railroad, assisting in the survey of the road from 
Columbus, Ohio, to Chicago. This work was done about 1864. Mr. Fisher 
also carried on agricultural pursuits, owning a farm two miles southeast of 



HISTORY OJ- LAKE COUNTY. 5^21 

Crown i'oint, and he thoroughly understood the best methods of caring for 
the fields and producing good crojjs. Whatever he undertook he carried for- 
ward to successful completion, for he was a man of unfaltering energy and 
strong purpose. 

Mr. J"'isher was united in marriage to Miss Amelia J. VVilley, who was 
lx.irn in Lake county. The VVilley family is of English lineage and was estal>- 
lished in America in early colonial days by David VVilley, the great-grand- 
father of -Mrs. l-'ishcr. His son, Jermiah VVilley, was Ix^rn in Connecticut, 
July 28, 1777, and there resided for many years, Imt eventually removed to 
the Empire state. Her father, Cer>rge Willey, was born in Connecticut and 
was four years of age when he removed to Madison county. New York, with 
his parents. In August, J838, he arrived in Lake county, Indiana, locating in 
Hanover township. He removed to a farm alxjut a mile east of Crown Point 
in 1865, and there he spent his remaining days, devoting his energies to agri- 
cultural jmrsuits until his death, which occurred on the 5th of April, 1884. 
He was one of the pioneers of this county and did much for its early develop- 
ment and improvement. He was ever actively interested in public affairs, 
was zealous in his advocacy <>i all measures that tended to prrjmrjte the gen- 
eral welfare arul was widely known as an influential anfl valued citizen. His 
wife Ijorc the maiden name of Clynthia Nash and was a native of Madison 
county, New York, and a daughter of Thomas Nash, Mr, anrl Mrs, Willey 
became the jjarcnts of seven children, four .Sfjns and three daughters, but 
three of the sons died in infancy. The only surviving son is George A, Willey, 
a resident of St, L^juis, Missfjuri, The sisters are Mrs, Alice Granger, of 
I''ort Dodge, Iowa, and Mrs, Adella C, Griffin, of Oklahoma, Mrs, l''isher is 
the eldest of the seven children and was born in Hanover t^nvnship. Lake 
Cfmvty, Indiana, April 30, iH^i. She pursued her early education in the 
district schools and afterward continued her education in Crown Point. She 
gave her haml in marriage to Mr. I-'isher on the 7th of November, 1865, and 
Ijy this marriage there have )>cen born two children, Agnes May, who died 
when twenty months old, and George W,, who is now a resident of Crown 
Point, 

In his political views John Fj.sher was a life-long Kq^ublican, and polit- 
ical questions had for him great interest. He was a Koyal Arch Mason and 
was a amsJstent and faithful member of the Presbyterian church. He died 



222 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

March 7, 1897, and because of his honoraljle, upright hfe he left to his family 

an untarnished name as well as a comfortable competence. He gained the 

respect of all with whom he had been associated, and his loss was therefore 

deeply deplored by his many friends as well as by his widow and son. Mrs. 

Fisher has spent her entire life in Lake county, Indiana, and is well known. 

She has been a resident of Crown Point for ten years, where she has a wide 

circle of friends. For many years she has been a member of the Presbyterian 

church. 

BALZER FRANZ. 

Balzer Franz, of section 8, Ross township, came to this township as a 
boy of twelve, some fifty-frve years ago, and when he began doing for !iim- 
self he had only his industry and strong constitution for his capital stock. 
He has been a hard worker and good manager all his life, and does not even 
now remit much of his former diligence, although the success that he has 
won gives him freedom from care and necessary business activity. He has 
proved himself an influential factor in the development of the agricultural 
interests of Lake county, and through his o\\n material prosperity and good 
citizenship has enriched the community in which he has passed so many 
years of his life. When he was a boy in the county there was not a railroad 
in operation through the county, from which fact it is evident that he has 
been a personal witness of all the great development that has resulted in 
making Lake county a network of railroad lines, and six acres from his own 
farm have been taken for railroad rights of way. 

Mr. Franz was born in Bavaria, Germany, March 21, 1836, so that 
he is now within the shadow of the age of threescore and ten. He remained 
in the old country until he was twelve years old, and then accompanied his 
mother and step-father to America, the family coming directly to Ross town- 
ship. Lake county. He was reared and has spent all his subsequent years in 
tliis countv, and during his boyhood attended for several years the township 
schools. Fie remained at home and worked for his mother and step-father 
until he was twenty-three years old, and for several years thereafter was 
engaged in various pursuits connected with farming, working en farms by 
the month, driving cattle to Chicago markets, hauling cord wood, etc. He 
was all the time getting a more substantial vantage ground in material worth, 
and was soon engaged ir. the operation of his own farm, from which time 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 223 

he has continued with increasing success in agricultural pursuits until he is 
now the owner of a fine farm of five hundred acres, well improved, highly 
cultivated and productive of as good all-around crops as are raised anywhere 
in Ross township. 

Mr. Franz has been married twice. In 1865 he wedded Miss Elizabeth 
Geibe, who died without issue. He then married Anna Shello, and they 
have nine children : George, Helen, Nora, Maggie, Elizabeth, Cecilia, Grace, 
Marv and Balzer. They were all born in Ross township, and all are well 
educated, Cecilia and Grace having finished the country schools and being 
now students in Merrillville. 

CHARLES W. FRIEDRICH. 

Charles ^^^ Friedrich, the miller at Dyer, has been successfully con- 
ducting the mill at this place for the past ten years, and has followed that 
line of business almost continuousl}- since he was fifteen years old, when he 
became an apprentice to the trade in his native Germany, r.nd where he 
learned all the details of the work in the thorough manner so mucti in 
vogue in the fatherland. He came to America during his young man- 
hood, and has had a very successful career in different parts of the middle 
west since that time. He is counted among the influential citizens at Dyer, 
and is enterprising and public-spirited in all that he undertakes, whether 
for personal advantage or for community interest. 

Mr. Friedrich was born in Germany, December 24, 1846, and was 
reared and educated in his native country. He attended the public schools 
during the required limit up to his fourteenth year, and then became a 
miller's apprentice, continuing his work faithfully for three years and gradu- 
ating as a master at the trade. He followed his chosen occupation in Ger- 
many until 1872, when he embarked and crossed the ocean to America. For 
some time he was engaged in the express, grocery and saloon business in 
Oak Park. Illinois. In 1881 he moved to North Judson, Starke county, 
Indiana, and bought a mill, which he operated until 1893. He then sold 
out, and in the following year came to Dyer and bought the flouring mill at 
this place. He has improved the plant in many ways, and increased its pro- 
ductive capacity to fifty liarrels a day besides adding to the quality of its 
output and building up an extensive trade and demand for all his products. 



224: HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Friedrich has been a Democrat ever since entering the ranks of 
American citizenship, and is loyal and pnblic-spirited in his attachment to 
his adopted land. He is a member of the Lutheran church, and also af- 
filiates with the ^fasonic fraternity at Hammond. 

He was married in 1870 to Miss Mary H. Ness, also a native of Ger- 
many. They are the parents of three children: William H.. wlio is at 
home, and who married Miss Ida Ross, of North Judson; Dr. L. M., of 
Hobart : and Jacob O., of Berwyn, Illinois. 

GEORGE W. YOUNG. 

George W. Young, a prominent farmer on section 32, Ross township, 
has lived in Lake county most of his life. He is almost a native son of the 
county since he was born very close to the line between this and Porter 
county. Outside of eleven years spent in business in Chicago, he has devoted 
most of his active years to farming, with such success that he is numbered 
among the representative men of that class in this section of Lake county. 
He is a man of ability in whatever enterprise he undertakes, and has more 
than once been influential in community affairs, having a public-spirited de- 
sire to further the material and social welfare of the county which has so 
long been his home. 

He was born just across the line in Porter county, Indiana, February 
25, 1852, a son of D. L. and Lovina (Guernsey) Young, the former a native 
of Pennsylvania and the latter of Canada, whence she came to Lake county 
in young" womanhood. His father came to Lake county about 1850, and died 
here in his sixty-second year. He followed the occupations of farming. 
carrying the mail and keeping hotel in Hobart. He was a well known old 
citizen, both of Lake and Porter counties, owning land in both counties. He 
carried the mail between Lake station and Crown Point. He was a life-long 
Republican. His ancestors were German. Flis first wife died at the age of 
thirty, having been the mother of two daughters and four sons, of whom four 
died young. George ^^^. the only living son, has a sister, Emma L., wife of 
Henry Cunningham. Mr. D. L. Young, by his second marriage, had three 
children, and the two living are D. L. and Malida, the latter the wife of 
Charles Miller. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 225 

Mr. Young \vas reared and educated in Lake and Porter counties, and for 
several years after taking up active work remained at home assisting his 
father on the farm. Li 1876, after his marriage, he went to Chicago, wliere 
for eleven years he was engaged in the ice business, being located on Twelfth 
street near L^nion. He sold out in 1887 and returned to Lake county, 
where he has since followed farming. He has a well-imi^roved farm of two 
hundred and fifty acres, and he raises general products, stock, and does dairy- 
ing, making it all a very profitable enterprise. 

Mr. Young has been a life-long Republican and cast his vote for Hayes, 
and at one time held the office of supervisor of the township. He is a mem- 
ber, at Hobart. of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, No. 2i33- and the 
Independent Order of Foresters, No. 141, at Holiart. 

He married, in 1876, Miss Susan S. Cunninghan.:, who died October 3, 
1890, having been the mother of six children : Carrie L. : George A. ; Del- 
bert E. ; Han-y L. ; Louie L. ; and Joseph W., deceased. The three eldest 
were born in Chicago, and the others in Lake county. Mr. Young was mar- 
ried in Lake county, Indiana, in 1892, to Mrs. O. M. Young, and one son 
was born, Isaac Lane, aged eleven, in the foiu"th grade. Mrs. Young is a 
native of Ohio, born in 1855 and was reared in Ohio and Indiana and edu- 
cated in the latter state. 

HON. JOHANNES KOPELKE. 

Hon. Johannes Kopelke, of Crown Point, is a lawyer of established 
reputation for ability and legal learning in northwestern Indiana, is an ex- 
senator of the state and has taken a prominent part in local and state politics, 
and throughout his career in this city of nearly thirty years has been a leader 
of public opinion and progress and more than once has been the aggressive 
spirit in carrying out reforms and suppressing abuses and in promoting and 
supporting the highest interests of social and institutional life. 

He was torn at Buchwald, near Neustettin, Prussia, June 14, 18^4. 
His father, Ferdinand Kopelke, was an Evangelical Lutheran minister. His 
mother was Sophia Erbguth, and her grandmother was a sister of the famous 
Prussian General York, who took the first step leading to the final overthrow 
of Napoleon in 181 3, and was afterward made a count and field marshal by 
the king of Prussia. 



226 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

J\Ir. Kopelke gained his early education in the people's schools of 
German}^ and from these entered a gymnasium, wher he continued the 
education which in America is offered by the high schools and colleges. 
From 1865 to 1871 he had a thorough grounding in the literary branches, 
especially the languages, in this typical German educational institution, and 
in the latter year, when se^-enteen years old, he came to the United States. 
He obtained his professional training in the law at the University of Michi- 
gan, wljich he attended from 1874 to 1876, graduating in the spring of the 
latter year. He has been fond of study from his toyhood days to the 
present, and while in the gymnasium he gained many prizes for scholarship, 
and was also a member of the society called "Thought Chips." composed of 
the members of the first class or "Prima." 

In April, 1876, 3ilr. Kopelke came to Crown Point and entered upon 
the career which has since been productive of so much honor to himself 
and benefit to the community. His German scholarship attracted the atten- 
tion of Hon. Thaddeus S. Fancher, a distinguished memljer of the bar at 
Crown Point, wlio ofifered young Kopelke a partnership in his large practice, 
which the latter accepted and continued until 1879, and since then he has 
managed his increasing legal interests alone. He has enjoyed a large private 
practice, and his connection with litigation of a public nature has won him 
no small degree of fame in this part of the state. One of his cases to attract 
the most attention was the one involving the constitutionality of the fee and 
salarv law. in 1891. He was also, as the assistant of Attorney General 
Ketcham, connected with the famous fight made to suppress racing and 
gambling institutions at Robey. For a number of years he has had all the 
professional business he could well manage, and his time and energies have 
often been called to other matters. For a tiiue he held the rank of major 
on the stafif of Governor Gray. 

Mr. Kopelke allied himself with the Rqxiblican party when he first 
beo-an casting his vote, but in 1882 he found his opinions to consist more 
harmoniously with those of the Democracy, and he has been a stanch advo- 
cate of that party ever since. In 1884 he was chosen presidential elector 
from the Tenth Indiana district, and thus cast one of the votes which placed 
Grover Cleveland in the presidential office. In 1891 he was elected to 
represent Lake and Porter counties in the state senate, and his career as a 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 227 

legislator was especially noteworthy in its results. He served on the 
judiciary and other important committees during both sessions of his term 
of office. He became prominent as the originator and promoter of measures 
for the welfare of the state, and he also carried through some remedial legis- 
lation regarding matters of practice and procedure. He was active in pro- 
curing the new charter for the city of Indianapolis, and his influence was 
strongly felt in behalf of the tax law which redeemed the state from Ijank- 
ruptcy. Senator Kopelke was the Democratic nominee for the office of 
appellate judge in 1898, but the state went strongly Republican that year. 

Mr. Kopelke is an Episcopalian in religious faith. He has never mar- 
ried. His long identification with Crown Point makes him one of the most 
highly esteemed citizens, and his life has been praiseworthy and fruitful in 
good results from whatever standpoint it is regarded. 

HENRY P. SWARTZ, M. D. 

For thirty-three years Dr. Henry P. Swartz was engaged in the practice 
of medicine and the conduct of a drug store at Crown Point, and is now 
closely and actively identified with business interests as president of the 
Commercial Bank. Thus, for many years he has been one of the forceful 
and honored factors in professional and financial circles, and his influence 
has not been a minor element in public affairs in northwestern Indiana. He 
has attained to prominence through the inherent force of his character, tlie 
exercise of his native talent and the utilization of surrounding opportunities, 
and he has become a capitalist whose business career has excited the admira- 
tion and won the respect of his contemporaries. 

Dr. Swartz was born at Spring yUWs. Center county, Pennsvlvania, 
July 12, 1841. The family is of German lineage and was founded in 
America by the grandfatlier of Dr. Swartz, who settled in the Kevstone 
state. There the father, Jacob Swartz, was born and reared, and by occupa- 
tion he became a stonemason. He also followed farming and on lea\-ing 
the east he removed to DeKalb county, Illinois, where he worked at farming. 
He also became the owner of a tract of land and carried on general agri- 
cultural pursuits. Politically he was a Democrat, and was a member of the 
Lutheran church. His death occurred when he was sixty-three years of 
age. His wife, who tore the maiden name of Catherine Mosser, was also a 



22S HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

native of Pennsylvania and died in Freeport, Illinois, in Januarv', 1903, in 
her eighty-eighth year. They were the parents of ten children, three daugh- 
ters and seven sons, all of whom reached adult age, and with the exception of 
the eldest, who died at the age of sixty-six years, all are yet living. 

Dr. Swartz is the third child and. third son of the family, and was 
reared in the place of his nativity until thirteen years of age, during which 
time he attended the public schools of Pennsylvania. On going to Illinois 
he became a student in the public schools of that state and assisted his father 
in farm work until twenty years of age. August 4. 1861, he enlisted as a 
memlier of Company A, Fifty-second Illinois Volunteer Infantry, becoming 
a private in the ranks of the Union army, with which he served until the 
close of the war. In the meantime he re-enlisted in the same company and 
regiment in 1863, and thus as an honored veteran he continued with the 
Ixiys in blue. He was promoted to the position of commissary sergeant of 
his regiment, and after his re-enlistment he was made quartermaster, but 
this position was conferred upon him so near the close of the war that he 
was mustered out as commissary sergeant. He participated in all of the 
battles with Sherman's forces and also made the celebrated march to the 
sea. His regiment brought the prisoners from Ft. Donelson to Chicago and 
returned by way of Paducah, Kentucky, and Shiloh. Mr. Swartz was with 
the regiment at the grand review in Washington, D. C, the most celebrated 
military pageant ever seen on the western hemisphere, and in July, 1865, 
he received an honorable discharge. At the battle of Shiloh Dr. Swartz 
was severely wounded, being shot through the body by a minie ball. This 
occurred in April, 1862, and October had arrived ere he was able to rejoin 
his regiment at Corinth. The succeeding morning he entered the battle at 
that place and was slightly wounded on the right side, which caused him 
to remain for four weeks longer in the hospital. 

When the country no longer needed his services Dr. Swartz took up his 
residence in Freeport. Illinois, and pursued a two years' course of study in 
Rush Medical College of Chicago. He then engaged in the drug business 
as a clerk for his brother in Freeport. Illinois, where he remained until 1871, 
when in the month of December of that year he located in Crown Point, 
Indiana. Here he established a drug store, which he conducted in connec- 
tion with the practice of medicine. He has here been engaged in practice 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 229 

for more than thirty-two years and has always maintained a position in the 
foremost ranks of the representatives of the medical fraternity in this portion 
of the state. Reading, experience and ohservation have continually broad- 
ened his Iniowledge and kept him in touch with the progress of the times. 
Dr. Swartz is also president of the Commercial Bank of Crown Point, and 
as chief executive oflicer of the institution his sound judgment and business 
ability are frequently called into use and have contributed in large measure 
to the successful conduct of the institution. 

In 1868 Dr. Swartz was united in marriage to Miss Mary Frances Bell, 
a daughter of William and Mary (Atkins) Bell. She was born in Ehnira. 
New York, and during her infancy her mother died so that she was reared 
by an aunt, ^Irs. Kimball, of Freeport. Illinois. She was a graduate of 
the high school there and pursued a literary course at Aurora, Illinois. She 
was afterward employed in the postoffice department at Freeport, Illinois, 
by her uncle. General S. T. Atkins. To ^Ir. and 'Sirs. Swartz have been 
torn four children: Carrie Belle, at home: Harry D., who is assisting his 
father in the drug store; Mamie G., the wife of Walter I. Coljle, of Chicago; 
and Catherine C. the wife of Alonzo D. Shoup, of Chicago. 

Dr. Swartz is a charter member of Lake Lodge No. 152. F. & A. ^l.. 
and has been a life-long Republican. He served as township trustee for a 
number of vears. was president of the Commercial Club for two years and 
has taken an acti\-e interest in all public matters — social, political and educa- 
tional. He is a man of distinct and forceful individuality, of broad men- 
tality and most mature judgment, and has left and is leaving his impress 
upon professional and financial interests in northwestern Indiana. He lias 
contributed to the advancement of the general welfare and prosperity of the. 
city in which he makes his home, and at the same time has so conducted his 
private business interests as to win gratifying success. 

DAVID C. ATKINSON. 

David Clarence Atkinson, attorney-at-law at Hammond, is one of the 
young members of the bar of Lake county, and during his five years" practice 
in Hammond has gained a most creditable degree of success. He has also 
some business interests in. the city and various properties in the county. He 



230 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

is a public-spirited man, capalile and stanch in his citizenship, and thoroughly 
representative of the best interests of his city. 

^Ir. Atkinson was bom near Oxford. Benton county, Indiana, April 8, 
1870, a son of Robert M. and Xancy E. (McClimans) Atkinson, lx)th 
natives of Ohio. The family history goes back to the English Quaker 
settlement of Pennsylvania in 1682, -when the first Atkinson ancestors settled 
there. Of such forefathers were Joseph and Susanna (Mills) Atkinson, both 
natives of Pennsylvania, and who were married there, becoming the parents 
of eleven children. They were the great-grandparents of David C. Atkin- 
son. Joseph was a wea\'er by trade, but later came to Ohio and took up 
farming. He bought two hundred acres of land in Clinton county, but 
fifteen years later, through a defective title, lost his purchase money and all 
his effects, and after that farmed the place on the shares until his death in 
1830. He was one of the pioneers of the state. 

Thomas M. Atkinson, the tenth child in the family of Joseph and 
Susanna Atkinson, was born in Pennsylvania, but came to Ohio in early 
youth. He was educated in a log schoolhouse, and mainly by his own 
efforts secured a good education. He was an eager and intelligent reader, 
and possessed a fine library. At the age of twenty years he married Miss 
Frances Head, and then moved to Greene county, Ohio, where he bought 
two hundred acres of military land and engaged in farming. He afterwards 
became one of the pioneers of Benton county, Indiana, where he herded 
cattle, and drove them to market at Philadelphia. He was a vigorous and 
active man. and when he had already rounded the sixtieth turn on life's 
journe}- he walked all the way from Benton county to Philadelphia to attend 
the Centennial celebration of 1876. He had also planned to walk to the 
World's Fair in Chicago in 1893, l^'-'t died the preceding winter at the ad- 
vanced age of eighty-three. He was first a Quaker in religious faith btit 
later espoused the Spiritualistic faith. He was a prominent man in his 
community. He was one of the first commissioners of Benton county, and 
in 1865 he represented Benton and \\niite counties in the lower house of 
the Indiana legislature. He was an abolitionist and later a Republican. In 
1830 he traded a horse worth fifty dollars to Luke Conner for two thousand 
acres of what were known as the "lost lands" in the south part of Benton 
county. He soon afterward sold this claim for one hundred dollars, but 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 231 

in 1848 purchased part of it back at thirteen dollars an acre, and moved his 
family to the land, on which he lived until a few years before his death. 
The land became very valuable and most productive farming property. He 
and his sons subsequentlv biiugbt up nearly all the original two thousand 
acres, and also owned twelve himdred acres besides. His wife also lived to 
a good old age, passing away when eighty-one years old, and they were 
the parents of twelve children, six sons and six daughters. Nine of these 
sons and daughters likewise attained to length of years, and they were all 
farmers or farmers' wives. 

Robert M. Atkinson, the son of Thomas M. Atkinson, was a farmer 
and stock-raiser in Benton county, and one of the county's most highly 
esteemed citizens. He ser\-ed several terms as commissioner of Benton 
county. He died there in February, 1881, at the age of fifty-six years. 
His wife survived him until August, 1889, at which time she was fifty-five 
years old. She was a Methodist. They were the parents of six children, 
five sons and one daughter, as follows : Morton C, of Oxford, Indiana ; 
Thomas L., of Toledo, Ohio; ^^'ilbert M., of Benton county; David C, 
of Hammond; Alice, wife of William Forsythe, of Indianapolis; and Curtis, 
of Oxford, Indiana. Nancy E. Atkinson, the mother of these children, 
was a daughter of William and Nancy (Pearson) McClimans, who were 
parents of twelve children. Her father was of Irish descent, and her mother 
of German ancestry. Her father li\-ed in Ohio, and died there past middle 
life, in 1840. 

David C. Atkinson was reared on his father's farm in Benton county. 
He received his early education in the district schools and then at the 
Oxford, Indiana, high school. He later entered the preparatory department 
of the State University, took the regular course in the university, graduating 
in 1893. In the following year he was a student in the University of 
Chicago, and received the degree of Master of Philosophy. His law studies 
were pursued at the Northwestern University Law School, where he was 
graduated in 1896 with the degree of LL. B. He was admitted to the bar 
of the supreme court of Illinois, and on mo\ing to Indianapolis was admitted 
to the Indiana bar in September, 1896. He carried on active practice in 
Indianapolis until March, 1899, and then opened his office in Hammond, 
which he has made the scene of his activities ever since. 



232 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Atkinson is a member of Hammond Lodge No. 210, K. of P., also 
of Royal League Council No. 38. He is a member of tbe Hammond Club. 
In politics he is a Republican, and he and his wife have church membership 
with the Plymouth Congregational church at Indianapolis. In addition to 
his pleasant home at 368 South Hohman street, he is interested in farm 
property. He is secretary of the Dermicilia Manufacturing Company. Mr. 
Atlcinson married, in June, 1895. Miss Lillian Knipp, a daughter of Fred 
and Pauline (Youche) Knipp. They have one daughter. Helen. 

HIRA^^I H. MEEKER. 

Hiram H. Meeker, the well known nurseryman and fruit grower of 
Crown Point, has been identified with this town for thirty-five years, com- 
prising the latter half of a very Ijusy and useful life, and his energies have 
been directed along several different lines of activity. He is one of the sur- 
viving veterans of the Civil war, in which he served until he was disabled, 
and it was only a few years after that contlict that he took up his residence in 
Crown Point, where mercantile interests, farming and tree culture and small 
fruit growing have at various times taken up his attention. 

Mr. Meeker was born in Wyoming county, Pennsylvania. IMarch 10. 
1835. a son of Joseph and Anna (Bronson) Meeker, the former a native of 
New Jersey and the latter of Connecticut. He is the third child and second 
son of the family of six children, all of whom grew to adult years. 

Mr. Meeker was reared on a farm in his native place and was educated 
in the common schools, remaining with his father until the outbreak of the 
Rebellion. In October, 1861, he enlisted in Company A. Fifty-seventh Penn- 
sylvania Infantry, as a private, and serxed until he was disabled during a 
forced march, near Poolville, Maryland. During the battle of Fredericks- 
burg he was acting steward in the hospital. He received his honorable dis- 
charge in the spring of 1863, having served for nearly two years. He re- 
turned home and remained in his native state for a few months and then came 
to Indiana and located in Carroll county. In i860 he came to Crown Point 
and for two years was engaged in the mercantile business, after which for the 
same period he followed farming. He then bought the stock in the same 
store and continued merchandising for several years, when he sold out anr.: 
has since then conducted a nursery which has become one of the important 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 233 

institutions of Crown Point and has maintained a reputation for the quaHty 
of its products. He makes a specialty of growing small fruit for the market, 
most of it being consumed in town. He has about seven acres within the city 
limits, and also forty acres near by, and also owns one of the nice residences 
of Crown Point. Mr. Meeker is one of the best posted men in Indiana on 
the subjects of the growth of small fruits, shrubbery, shade trees and all 
nursery stock. 

Mr. Meeker is a member of the John Wheeler Post No. i6i, G. A. R., 
and a member of the Masonic fraternity. He has been a life-long Republican 
in politics. He was married January 7, 1864. to Miss Mary A. Bryant, 
who was born in Coshocton county, Ohio, September 3, 1837, being a 
daughter of John and Susan (Graves) Bryant, of the William Cullen Bryant 
branch. There were three daughters born of this union : Addie is the wife 
of Julius Rockwell, of Crown Point ; Alta is the wife of William Thompson, 
of South Chicago ; and Josephine is a popular teacher in the public schools 
of Crown Point. Mrs. Meeker and her daughter Josephine are leading 
members of the Presbyterian church. 

FRANCIS P. KEILMANN. 

Francis P. Keilmann, of St. John, has the distinction of being the longest 
established merchant of Lake county. He began business in St. John nearly 
fifty-five years ago, and a continued record of success has been his lot to 
the present time, when, as the dean of Lake county business men, he enjoys 
along with his material prosperity the esteem and thorough confidence of 
all his old friends and associates. He and the family of which he is a member 
have been identified with Lake county and St. John township since pioneer 
times, for a period of sixty years, and their enterprise and personal influence 
have always been reckoned as important factors in the various affairs of 
the county. 

Mr. Keilmann was born in Hesse-Darmstadt, Germany, November 23, 
183 1. His father was Henry Keilmann, a native of the same place. He 
left the fatherland and brought his family to America in 1840, his first loca- 
tion being in Portage county, Ohio, but in 1844 he moved to Lake county. 
Indiana, and settled on a farm in St. John township. His life occupation 
was farming. He lived to the advanced age of eighty-five years. His wife 



234 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

was Mary Elizabeth Ofenloch, who was Ijorn in the same province of Ger- 
many as he, and died in Portage county, Ohio, wlien thirty-eight years old. 
They were parents of seven children, and all reached maturity. 

Mr. F. P. Keilmann, the fourth son and the fifth child of the family, was 
nine years old when he landed on American soil, and had already begun his 
education iu his native land. He remained with the family in Portage county 
for two years, and then, at the age of eleven, went to Chicago with his 
older brother, Henry. He attended school in that city for some time, and 
then joined his father on the latter's removal to Lake county. Two years 
later, however, he returned to Chicago and clerked in a store for four 
years. He then came to St. John township and became a clerk in his brother 
Henry's store at St. John. The brothers soon formed a partnership, and 
the firm of Henry and F. P. Keilmann continued to do business in St. John 
until 1865, having the premier mercantile establishment of the village. In 
1865, after fifteen years' connection, Francis bought the interest of his 
brother, and then took George F. Gerlach, another well known merchant 
of St. John, into partnership, continuing thus until 1885. Since that time 
Mr. Keilmann has carried on his business alone, and no other man in the 
county has a record for such long connection with mercantile enterprises. 
He has a large store and a fine general stock valued at about ten thousand 
dollars. He owns Lake county real estate to the amount of over a thou- 
sand acres, and also has property in other places. He has always affiliated 
with the Democratic party, and from 1856 to 1885 was postmaster of 
St. John. 

In 1857 Mr. Keilmann married Margaret Schaefer, who was born in 
Germany and came to America in childhood with her parents. There are 
nine living children of this marriage: Susan, who is the wife of Joseph 
H. Gerlach, of Chicago; Francis B., of Chicago; John, of Crown Point; 
William F., of St. John; Elizabeth, wife of Edward Schmal. of Chicago; 
Margaret, unmarried; George: Lena, wife of Frank Thiel. of St. John; and 
Peter. All these children were born in the same house and in St. John town- 
ship, and they are now all capable and worthy men and women. 

JOHN M. THIEL. 

John M. Thiel, the genial old "village blacksmith"' of St. John, came to 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 235 

Lake county as a German lad of ten years old, and has been numbered among 
the citizens of the county for all the subsequent sixty odd years. He 
learned his trade in the county, and established his shop in St. John forty- 
seven vears ago, so that his place of business is the oldest of its kind in the 
county, and he himself holds the palm for long continuance at his trade. 
At the age of seventy-three, he is still hearty and strong, does a day's work 
that he need not be ashamed of, and is respected and honored through- 
out the township not only because he has so long been a factor of its in- 
dustrial enterprise but also because of his personal character and genmne 
worth of citizenship. 

Mr. Thiel was born in Prussia, Germany, ^Nlay 15, 1832, a son of John 
and Marv ( Klassen) Thiel, who emigrated from their German fatherland 
in 1842 and settled in Lake county, Indiana, about a mile and a half from 
St. John. His father devoted himself to the improvement and cultivation 
of a farm, and lived there till his death, when he was aliout eighty-two 
years of age, and his wife died in the same place at the age of seventy-seven. 
They were jiarents of twelve children, and seven of them grew to man- 
hood and womanhood. 

John ^I. Thiel is the fourth son. He was ten years old when he came 
to Lake county, where he was reared and received his English education. 
At the age of twenty he left his parents" home and went to Crown Point, 
where he served his time at learning the blacksmith trade. After his ap- 
prenticeship of two years he worked at his trade in Crown Point for three 
years, and in 1857 came to St. John and opened his own shop, which he has 
conducted from that year to this, always giving satisfaction to his large 
patronage and at the same time being on good terms with every person 
in the community. Besides this business, which he still carries on, he owns 
a fifty-acre farm in the town of St. John, and this is managed bv his son 
Joe. In politics Mr. Thiel has always been a Democrat, and he and his 
family are all members of the Catholic church in St. John. 

In 1857, the same year in which he located in St. John, Air. Thiel mar- 
ried Miss Susan Davis, who was born in the same prcjvince of Germany 
as Mr. Tliiel, but preceded him to America by two years. They are the 
parents of seven children, all of whom were born in St. John: Jacob mar- 
ried Lena Thiesen, who died, and he now lives in Whiting; George mar- 



236 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

ried Flora Sneider and lives in Chicago; Elierhard married ]\Iary Scheidt, 
and works in the shop with his father; Joe. mentioned ahove, is the only 
one of the children who has not married ; Frances, who married John Dietz, 
died in 1894; Clara, also deceased, was the wife of Jacob Keilmann; Thresia, 
wife of Henry Neibling, resides in St. John. 

J. FRANK MEEKER. 

J. Frank Meeker, county attorney of Lake county, is one of the younger 
members of the bar at Crown Point, but during the twelve years of his 
practice he has acquired an extensive clientage and in the later years found 
himself in possession of as much business as he can consistently manage. He 
is thoroughly identified with the interests of Lake count}-, having known 
it all his life, and he has the distinction of being one of the youngest of the 
log-cabin children of northwestern Lidiana, to which favored class some of 
the most prominent men of the present belong, but whose day and genera- 
tion are of the past in the populous and highly developed state of Indiana. 

Mr. Meeker was born December 11, 186S, and his birthplace was in 
Center township, fi\-e miles east of Crown Point, in the primitive and pioneer 
log caljin that his father had made his home place on first coming to the 
county. His parents are Sherman B. and Elizabeth (Cress) Meeker, both 
natives of Pennsylvania and now living retired from the active duties of life 
at Crown Point. His father, on emigrating to the west, first established his 
home in Illinois, afterwards located in Michigan, and in 1866 came to Lake 
county, Indiana, settling in Center township, where he followed the occupa- 
tion of farming" for a number of years. He and his wife were the parents 
of four children : Nathan Brewster, who is engaged in farming on the 
old homestead ; Charles H., conducting an implement business at Crown 
Point; Henrietta, the deceased wife of Elliott Bibler; and J. Frank. 

Mr. J. Frank Meeker, the youngest of the family, spent his early boy- 
hood da}s upon the old homestead in Center township, attending the dis- 
trict schools. He came to Crown Point at the age of thirteen, and con- 
tinued his education here until graduated from the high school. Later he 
took up the study of law with Mr. Peterson, under whose direction he con- 
tinued his reading for about two years, and he afterward entered the Uni- 
versity of Michigan, at Ann Arbor, where he was graduated in the law 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 237 

department with the class of 189J. In the same year lie made the beginnings 
of his practice at Crown Point, was then at Hammond for one year, after 
which he returned to Cro\\n Point, which has been the center of his activity 
ever since. He was in partnership with Judge McMahan for two years, but 
since then has practiced alone and built up a very fine patronage. He served 
as deputy prosecuting attorney for two terms, covering four years, and in 
February, igoi, was appointed county attorney, which office he still fills. 

Mr. Meeker since taking his place among the legal fraternity at Crown 
Point has taken considerable interest in Republican politics, and has done 
much for the organization and influence of that party in Lake county. He 
is vice chairman of the county central committee. He is a member of the 
Masonic fraternity at Crown Point, of the Knights of Pythias, the Inde- 
pendent Order of Foresters and the North American Union. 

On March 24, 1894, Mr. Meeker was united in marriage with Miss 
Stella S. Colby, a daughter of Mrs. Catherine Colby. She is also a native 
of Lake county, and has the distinction of being the only w'oman who has 
qualified and obtained admission to the bar of Lake countv. Mr. and Mrs. 
Meeker have one daughter, Stella. 

CHARLES E. GREEN WALD. 

Endowed by nature with peculiar qualifications that comliine to make 
a successful lawyer and possessing the energy and determination without 
which advancement at the bar can never be secured, Charles E. Greenwald 
has won for himself a prominent position as a representative of the legal 
fraternity in Lake county. Patiently persevering, possessed of an analvtical 
mind and one that is readily recepti\'e and retenti\-e of the fundamental prin- 
ciples and intricacies of the law, gifted wkh a spirited de\-iition ti:) wearisiime 
details, quick to comprehend the most subtle problems and logical in his 
conclusions, fearless in the advocacy of any cause he may espouse and the 
soul of honor and integrity, Mr. Greenwald has achieved a position of prom- 
inence that is most creditalile and is a recognized leader of public thought 
and opinion in the communit\- in which he resides. 

A native of Ohio, his birth occurred in the citv of Cleveland on the 
2ist of January, 1876. He is a son of Joseph and Mary (Mack) Green- 
wald, and he began his education in the public schools of Cle\-eland and 



238 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

afterward continued his studies in the high school of South Chicago. He 
took up the study of law in 1895, having determined to make its practice 
his life work, and was graduated from the law department of the University 
of Michigan at Ann Arbor with the class of 1898. He then located for 
practice at Whiting, opening an office here. Although professional advance- 
ment is proverbially slow and he had to demonstrate bis skill in handling 
intricate legal problems, he won a good clientage in a comparatively short 
space of time, and in 1902 he was elected city attorney of Whiting. He has 
been deputy prosecuting attorney since 1898, and is now the candidate on 
the Republican ticket for prosecuting attorney of the district composed of 
Lake and Porter counties. In this connection one of the Republican papers 
of Whiting said : 

"Attorney Charles E. Greenwald of our city has announced himself as 
a candidate for the Republican nomination for prosecuting attorney. For 
months many influential lawyers and politicians have insisted that he should 
be a candidate, but until this week failed to get his consent that his name 
might be used. Mr. Greenwald has served six years as deputy prosecuting 
attornev here, and his conduct of the office during this time justifies his 
friends in their claim that he has shown himself well qualified to fill the posi- 
tion. He is regarded by the lawyers as one of the most promising young- 
men at the bar, and the number of lawyers who are supporting him is the 
best possible evidence of his ability to fill the position. He is a 'Strong favorite 
with the politicians and other men interested in the success of tlie Republican 
party in this county, recognizing the loyal services rendered for his partv in 
previous campaigns. The active Republicans of Lake county are fjuick to 
remember and repay those who have rendered valiant service to the party, 
and this sentiment will enure to Mr. Greenwald's advantage as against any 
opponent who may contest with him for the nomination." 

In his private practice Mr. Greenwald has shown great care in the 
preparation of his cases, and as a ]niblic official in courtroom he has been 
unfaltering in the performance of his duty in furthering the ends of justice 
and right. He is one of the stockholders of the First National Bank of 
Whiting. 

In the year 1900 Mr. Greenwald was united in marriage to Miss Christine 
Michaely of Michigan City and they have on little daughter, Dorothy. Tliey 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 239 

are well known in Whiting and have gained a wide circle of warm friends. 
Mr. Greenwald is a scholarly gentleman who speaks four dififerent languages 
— the Polish, Slavonian, Bohemian and English. In politics he is a stanch 
Republican, and has taken a very active and influential part in the work of 
the organization, doing all in his power to promote its growth and insure 
its success. He organized the National Slavonian Political Club, which has 
been in existence for two years and is now one of the prominent organiza- 
tions in this part of Indiana, composed of about two hundred men. The 
object of the club is to teach political economy and civil government. He 
is well fitted for leadership and his opinions carry weight and influence in 
political and other circles in Whiting. 

CHARLES H. MEEKER. 

Charles H. Meeker, who is energetic and notably reliable in business 
afifairs, is now dealing in agricultural implements in Crown Point. He has 
never sought to figure before the public in any light save that of a business 
man and in his chosen field of labor he has won confidence and respect and 
at the same time has gained a fair measure of success. He was born in 
Calhoun county, Michigan, on the 2d of November, 1857, and is the second 
son and third child of Sherman and Elizabeth A. (Cress) Meeker. His 
father was born in Pennsylvania and on emigrating westward established 
his home in Illinois. He afterward located in Michigan and in 1867 came 
to Lake county, Indiana, settling in Center township, where he followed the 
occupation of farming for a number of years. He now lives retired in Crown 
Point. His wife tore the maiden name of Elizabeth Cress, who is also a 
native of Pennsylvania, and a resident of Crown Point. They are the parents 
of four children : Nathan Brewster, who is engaged in farming on the old 
homestead; Charles H., who is conducting an implement business at Crown 
Point: Henrietta, the deceased wife of Elliott Bibler: and J. Frank, an 
attorney of Crown Point. 

\\'hen only about a year old Charles H. Meeker was taken by his 
parents to White county. Indiana, while the family home was afterward 
established in Carroll county when he was six years of age. In the fall of 
1867 he removed to Lake county, where he attended the district schools of 
Center township. He was reared in the usual manner of farmer lads, early 



240 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

becoming familiar with the duties and labors that fall to the lot of the agri- 
culturist, and he continued to assist his father up to the time of his marriage. 

It was on the 22d of September, 1880, that ]\Ir. Meeker was joined in 
wedlock to Aliss Rose A. Sweeney, a daughter of James and Elizabeth 
(Johnson) Sweeney, who was born in Center township, Lake county, 
Indiana, and was educated in the same school that her husband attended. 
The young couple located on a farm lying in Center and Ross townships, 
and there ]Mr. ^Meeker engaged in farming for ten years. In 1891, how- 
ever, he retired from that department of labor and established an agricultural 
implement business in Crown Point, since which time he has dealt in farm 
machinery of all kinds. He also handles buggies and wagons, and he draws 
his patronage from almost every section of the county. He is one of the best 
known men in this line of business, and has secured a liberal patronage which 
is constantly growing. His Ijusiness methods are such as will liear the closest 
investigation and scrutiny, and his earnest desire to please his patrons com- 
binetl with strong and honorable purpose has been the foundation upon 
which he has builded his prosperity. 

Mr. Meeker keeps well informed on the cjuestions and issues of the 
day and gives a stalwart support to the principles of the Republican party. 
In 1904 ]\Ir. Aleeker was nominated for the ofifice of township trustee of 
Center township. He belongs to the Independent Order of Foresters and to 
the fire company at Crown Point. He is well known throughout this por- 
tion of the state, his business taking him to all parts of the count}-, and he 
has thus formed a wide acciuaintance and gained the warm regard of many 
friends. His residence in Lake county covers thirty-seven years and there- 
fore he has been a witness of much of its development, progress and ad- 
vancement. 

GEORGE M. HORNECKER. 

George M. Hornecker is the proprietor of the Fair, a general department 
store at ^^'hiting" and in this connection has met with very creditable success. 
In viewing the mass of mankind in the varied occupations of life, the con- 
clusion is forced upon the observer that in the vast majority of cases men 
have sought employment not in the line of their peculiar fitness, but in those 
fields where caprice or circumstances have placed them, thus explaining the 
reason of the failure of ninetv-five Der cent of those who enter commercial 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 241 

and professional circles. In a few cases it seems that men with a pecuhar 
fitness for a certain line have tal<en it np. and marked success has followed. 
Such is the fact in the case of the suhject of this liiography. 

Mr. Hornecker is a native son of Illinois, his hirth having occurred in 
Henry county, that state, on the 3d of October, 1873. He is a son of G. J. 
and Catherine (Ernst) Hornecker, who were natives of Germany, whence 
they came to America in earh- life. Here they were married and established 
their home in Illinois. They l:ecanie the parents of nine children, of wliom 
George M. Hornecker is the fifth in nrtler of liirth. He was reared and 
educated in his native county, attending the public schools, and ^\■hen not 
engaged with the duties of the schoolroom he devoted his attention to agri- 
cultural pursuits. After putting aside his text-books he followed farming 
until 1896, when he came to Whiting and began wc^rking for the Standard 
Oil Company. He also engaged in clerking in a hardware store for about 
two years, and on the 8th of August, iSt)/. he began business on his own 
account by purchasing and opening up a small stock of hardware. He 
received a good patronage and within a short time was enabled to extend 
the scope of his business by adding other departments. His trade has 
rapidly increased along substantial lines, and he now has the largest store 
in Whiting. It is called the Fair and is a credit to the town. He makes 
careful selection of his goods, sells at prices which are fair alike to pur- 
chaser and to merchant and by his honorable dealing has won the unqualified 
confidence of the public. He is also a member of the Chicago Telephone 
Company at Whiting and the ofifice of this company is in his building. He 
is likewise a stockholder in the First National Bank, and his influence has 
been a potent factor in commercial and financial circles of this city. 

In 1897 :\Ir. Hornecker was united in marriage to Miss Clara IM. S. 
Wille, and to them have been born three children who are yet living, while 
their second child. Gertrude .\.., is deceased. Those who snr\i\e are 
Laura C, Martin G. and Robert A. Mr. and Mrs. Hornecker are repre- 
sentati\e meniiers of the German Lutheran church, of which her father, 
Rev. H. Ph. Wille, is now minister. 

Through his business interests Mr. Hornecker has contributed in no 
small degree to the upbuilding of the town. He erected his first business 
building in 1901, and has also added another of the same size — twentv-five 

16 



242 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

by seventy-five feet. In the second building he occupies three floors with 
his large line of general merchandise. He is treasurer of the Whiting volun- 
teer fire department. In politics he is a Republican, and, May 2, 1904, he was 
elected to represent the Second ward in the City Council of Whiting. He 
is a member of some of the most important committees. Mr. Hornecker 
entered upon his business career with very limited capital, yet his efforts 
have been so discerningly directed along well defined lines of labor that he 
seems to have realized at any one point of progress the full measure of his 
possibilities for accomplishment at that point. A man of distinct and forceful 
individuality, broad mentality and most mature judgment, he has left and 
is leaving his impress upon the mercantile world, and at the same time his 
business is of such a nature that it promotes the commercial prosperity of 
the town and thus contributes to its general benefit and growth. 

FRANK HESS. 

Frank Hess, treasurer of the city of Hammond and otherwise prominent 
in the public and Ijusiness life of his city and county, is a native son of 
Lake county and has lived here all his life, for over half a century. For 
fifteen years he has taken a leading part in the official matters of his county, 
has been the incumbent of some place of trust during this time, and in what- 
ever relation he has met his fellow-citizens has won their entire confidence 
and esteem. 

Mr. Hess was burn in Xorth township. Lake county. Indiana, Novem- 
ber 17. 1853, being the only son and child of Joseph and Marv Ann (Sack- 
ley) Hess. His mother was a native of Canada and a daughter of William 
Sackley. She died in i860, when Frank was seven years old. Joseph Hess 
\vas a native of France, and was one of three sons and one daughter, children 
of a life-long resident of France.* Joseph Hess was a baker Iiy trade. He 
came to America aliout 1846, and worked at his trade in Syracuse, New 
York, for a time, and in 184S moved west to Chicago. About 1852 he 
settled at West Point, or Gibson station, in Lake county. Indiana, having 
come to North township. Lake county, in 1850. That place was then the 
■western end of the Michigan Central line of railroad, passengers being carried 
by stage from there into Chicago. He conducted an eating house there for 
a short time, and then mo\-ed to the place which was named in his honor. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 243 

- Hessville. He was in the cattle and stock Ijusiness there for a time, and tlien 
condncted a general store. He held the office of trustee of North township 
for twenty-two years, and was also postmaster of Hessville for nearly forty 
years, his second wife having the place after his death. He died in August, 
1895, past seventy-one years of age. He was recognized as one of the most 
prominent citizens of that part of Lake county, and in many ways was identi- 
fied with the progress and development of the community. He was a devoted 
member of the Catholic church. He married for his second wife Elizabeth 
Natke, and they had eleven children, nine of whom are now living: Edward; 
Alice, deceased, who was the wife of Fred Scheuneman, dlso deceased; 
George; William; Julius; Gustave, deceased; Albert; Joseph; Emma, who 
was the second wife of Fred Scheuneman, and after his death married 
William Bundy ; John, and Lydia. 

]\Ir. Frank Hess was reared on a farm in Lake county, and secured 
his education by attendance at the district schools. He remained with his 
father and assistetl in his business until he was married at the age of twenty- 
six. He early took a prominent part in the public affairs of his township, 
and served as assessor of North township for thirteen years. He was city 
councilman of Hammond for three years, was city clerk for four years, and 
in' 1892 was elected city treasurer, which position he has held and whose 
responsible duties he has discharged most faithfully to the present time. He 
has always been an advocate of the principles and policies of the Republican 
party. He is vice-president and also a director of the Lake County Trust 
and Savings Bank. He built his good home at 443 North Hohman street 
in 1886. and besides has other business interests and property in the city 
and county. 

Mr. Hess married. May 24, 1879, Misss Emma Haselbach, a daughter 
of August and Mary (Grabo) Haselbach. Ten children were born of their 
union, but all died when young. Mrs. Hess died February 12, 1894. On 
October 10, 1895, ^Ir. Hess married Miss Martha Karsten, a daughter of 
John and ALary Karsten. They have one claughter, Emma C. Mrs. Hess is a 
member of the Lutheran church. Mr. and Mrs. Hess ha\-e an adopted 
daughter, Lydia Hess, bom ]\Iay 13, 1895. 



244 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

JOHN P. SCHAEFER. 

John P. Scliaefer, of Section 33, St. John township, is a Hfe-long 
resident of Lake connty, and for many years has been one of its prominent 
farmers and representative citizens. He has been frugal, industrious and 
a good manager all through his career, and at the prime of his years has 
acquired a competence in a fine landed estate. He farms the small place 
where he resides, and rents out most of his other property. He has also 
identified himself with various community interests, and as an all-round 
successful man is a fine example of sterling American citizenship. 

Mr. Schaefer was born in Center township of Lake county, on October 
9, 1854. His father, Jacob Schaefer, a native of Germany, is counted among 
the early settlers of Lake county, and lived to be eighty-three years old, having 
spent his life as a farmer. His wife was Maggie Willem, also a native of 
German}', and she died at about the age of sixty-fi\'e years. There were 
nine children in the family and all of them reached manhood and womanhood. 

Mr. John P. Schaefer was the youngest of the family. He was nine 
years old when the family moved o\-er into St. John townsliip, and he was 
reared and received most of his education here. He remained at home and 
assisted his father in the cultivation of the farm until the 'after'? death, 
and he has continued farming to the present, gradually adding to his estate 
interests as he was prospered. He now owns four hundred acres where the 
old homestead is situated, and seventy-three acres where his present resi- 
dence is located. He does general farming and stock-raising. He located 
on his present farm in 1901. having lived in section 35 previous thereto, 
and gives most of his own labors and attention to the seventv-three acres 
at his home, renting nearly all the rest of his land. 

Mr. Schaefer is a Democrat as far as concerns national jiolitics. but in 
local affairs tries to vote for the liest man. regardless of what party tag he 
bears. He has church membership w ith the St. John's Catholic church. 
He was married in 1883 to Miss Susan Jordan, who was born in St. John 
township, Lake county. October 5, 1864. a daughter cf John A. and Johanna 
(Klassen) Jordan, old settlers of Lake county. Mr. and Mrs. Schaefer have 
six children : Maggie, Edward, Carrie, Zelie, Mary and John A. 



•t 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 245 

FLOYD M. PIERCE. 

Floyd M. Pierce is the eldest child of Marion F. and Maggie (Ran- 
dolph J Pierce, whose biographies as prominent citizens of Lake county are 
given on other pages of this history. The son has himself found a broad 
field of usefulness in his native county, and Ross township has especial reason 
to be proud and grateful for his sterling and public-spirited citizenship and 
his loyalty to all that concerns the general welfare. Both now and in later 
years his work for the educational interests of the township will be cherished 
and held up as one of his most important achievements. As trustee of the 
township he has given a far more than ordinary or perfunctory attention to 
the practical matters of education, and every child of school age is receiving 
more or less benefit from the enlarged educational opportunities which have 
been so largely the result of his endeavor and ambition along these lines. 

This leading young business man and pulilic official of Ross township 
was born in the township and county of his present residence, on May 25. 
1S73. He was educated in the public schools and the Northern Indiana 
Normal School at Valparaiso, after which he taught school for two years, 
from which experience his later work for the schools has received the greater 
stamp of practicality and effective direction. He was also appointed to the 
office of postmaster of Merrilhille for a term of four years, and at the present 
time is successfully engaged in the coal Ijusiness at this town. 

Politically Mr. Pierce follows his father in adhering stanchly to Demo- 
cratic principles. He was elected to the office of trustee of Ross township 
in 1900, and still holds that important office. During his term he has had 
the oversight of the construction of three schoolhouses and has otherwise 
been a leader in l()ca! affairs. He was directly concerned with the erection 
of the beautiful high school building at Merrillville. which is an honor to the 
town, the township and county, and shows how thoroughly this section of 
northwestern Indiana is living up to the reputation for high educational 
ideals established for the entire state of Indiana. The high school is seventy- 
four feet front and thirty-six feet wide, has two stories and a seven-foot 
basement, is built of stone and pressed brick, is heated by two furnaces, con- 
tains four large rooms, and is finished throughout after the most modern 
style of school architecture and educational equipments. The total cost of 



246 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tliis permanent and model structure was seven thousand dollars, and its dura- 
bility and thoroughness of construction are its chief points of economy, and 
it is altogether a credit to the taxpayers of the community. The rooms are 
seated with desks of tlie most approved and hygienic pattern, there are 
genuine slate blackboards, speaking tubes, and many other points of equip- 
ment which would astonish the old-time educator of half a century ago. In 
1903 the Merrillville high school held an exhibition of the work done by the 
pupils of the manual training department, and the products of their youthful 
skill and handiwork were of such high grade that the photos of the different 
articles have been sent to St. Louis and are now on exhibition there at the 
World's Fair. Prior to the erection of the high school building the school 
contained only eight grades, but since 'Sir. Pierce's administration the full 
twelve grades have heen instituted and now afford the children of Ross 
township unecjualled opportunities for public school education. Another act 
of his administration has been the discontinuing of three small rural schools 
and their consolidation with the central school, the pupils being transported 
at the public expense to the school daily, and this has been done with de- 
creased expenditure for maintenance and with much increased efficiency in 
the character of work accomplished. 

Mr. Pierce has fraternal affiliations with the ^Masonic lodge No. 551 
and with Hobart Tent No. 65 of the Knights of the Maccabees. He was 
married, February 16, 1895, to Miss Lillie M. Niksch, and they have three 
children. Vida, Myra and the baby. \^ida is now in the second grade of her 
school work. Mrs. Pierce was bom January 25, 1876, and was reared in 
this county and educated in the common schools. Her father passed away 
March 2, 1903, at the age of seventy-seven, but her mother is still li\-ing at 
the age of seventv-two. 



-*& 



JOSEPH PATTON. 

Joseph Patton, who for some years has been living retired from active 
life at Crown Point, is a pioneer farmer and settler of Lake county, with over 
fifty years of continuous residence to his credit. During most of this long 
period he has made farming his vocation, and still retains the farm on which 
he laid the basis of his prosperity. He has also given time and energv to the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 24 7 

promotion of the general welfare of his community, and now at the age of 
three score and ten ranks among the men of influence and ability and excel- 
lent personal character and reputation in this part of Lake county. 

Mr. Patton was born in Trumbull county, Ohio. October 17, 1834. His 
father, John H. Patton, was born in Mercer county. Pennsylvania, and came 
to Lake county in 1852 from Trumbull county, Ohio, locating and improving 
a farm in \\'infield township, where he died in 1865 at the age of sixty-five 
years. He married Eliza Jane Dixon, who was born in Ireland and came to 
America when about fourteen years old. and who died at the age of sixty- 
seven years. They were the parents of sixteen children, and all of these grew 
up and married (except the oldest, who never married) and lived to be past 
thirty-five years of age. Some of them still live, being from seventy to 
eighty years old. 

Mr. Joseph Patton. the seventh son and twelfth child, was reared in 
Trumbull county, Ohio, up to his eighteenth year, receiving most of his 
education in the old-time log schoolhouse, and in 1852 he accompanied his 
parents to Lake county. That was an early year in the history of Lake county, 
and there were but three stores in Crown Point at the time. In 1855, after 
he had married, he located on land of his own in W'infield township, where 
he cleared and improved a good farmstead of one hundred and sixty acres, 
building the houses and barns and completing the last of the important im- 
provements in 1882. This is one of the model places of the township, and 
he still owns it and finds it a steady source of revenue, although in 1882 he 
retired from its active and personal management and moved into Crown 
Point, where he also has a fine property. He deserves the comforts of 
retired life, and as one of the old settlers has reaped his share of the profits 
accruing to those who place themselves in the van of progress and help 
develop a new country for the uses of civilization. 

He has also been identified with the public life of Lake county, and is 
one of the life-long and influential Republicans of the county. During the 
Civil war he enlisted and served as a member of Company E, One Hundred 
and Fifty-first Indiana Infantry, his record to the end of the war having been 
most creditable. He is now a member of the John Wheeler Post, G. A. R., 
at Crown Point. He has been a member of the ]\Iethodist Episcopal church 
for forty-five years, and has filled all the offices and is devoted to its work. 



248 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

He was trustee for about twenty years and is now class leader and also treas- 
urer. He has handled all the money for the erection of the church at Crown 
Point, and has contributed much of his own to the various departments of 
church work. 

Mr. Patton married, in 1854, Miss Phebe Folsom, who was born in 
Trumbull county, Ohio, and who became the mother of two daughters : 
Olive, the wife of ^^'illiam Pardington, of Chicago ; and Ida May, the widow 
of Lincoln S. Blakman. In 1867 Mr. Patton married his present wife, Mrs. 
Eliza (Foster) Patton, who also had two daughters: Hattie, who died at the 
age of one and a half years; and Jennie, the wife of Edward Muzzall, and 

they have four children. 

REUBEN FIIPSLEY. 

Reuben Hipsley, retired farmer and ex-county commissioner, residing 
at Palmer, Winfield township, has lived in Lake county for over fifty years, 
and most of that time has been spent in farming He retired a few years 
ago and moved into Palmer, but still supervises his farming operations and 
takes active part in Ijusiness affairs. His career throughout has been one 
of integrity and upright dealings, and besides being successful in his life 
work he has found time to devote to public affairs and has been honored with 
the most important county office. 

Mr. Hipsley was l:)orn in Knox county, Ohio, August 22, 1846. His 
grandfather, Joshua Hipsley, was born in Maryland, of German descent, 
followed for a life occupation farn.iing, and was one of the pioneers of Knox 
county, Ohio. Jonathan Lewis Hipsley, the father of Reuben, was born 
twenty miles from Baltimore, Maryland, March 4, 1820, and died January 2, 
1S95. At the age of fourteen he accompanied his parents to Knox county, 
Ohio, and was reared and lived there until 1853, when he located in Lake 
county, Indiana, and bought and improved a farm of one hundred acres in 
\\'infiel(I township, on winch he was living at the time of his death.. He 
was a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, was a stanch \\'hig during 
the existence of that party, and afterward became an equally ardent Repub- 
lican. He married Eliza Phillips, who was born in Jefferson county. Ohio, 
was reared in- Knox county of the same state, and now makes her home at 
Mt. Vernon, Ohio. She is eighty years old, having been born August i, 
1824. Her father was Reuben Phillips, probably born in Pennsylvania. 




yHjUQ . lHjU.<J-Lyy} H^^f^BlL^ 





/t^^/C^h^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. '2i9 

Jonathan Hipslev and his wife had fi\'e chikh"en : John, deceased; Reuhen ; 
Charles, of Broken Bow, Nehraska : Sarah, wife of J. J. Stoffer, of Knox 
county, Oliio; and Phebe, deceased. 

Mr. Reuben Hipslev was about six years old when he moved with the 
family from Knox county, Ohio, to Lake county, so that his schooling was 
received in this county. He remained at home and assisted his father until 
his marriage, in 1870, and he then located in Winfield township on a farm 
that he still owns. He was engaged in farming there until 1900, when he 
built a residence in Palmer and moved to town. He has one of the nicest 
residences in this part of the county. He owns about three hundred acres 
of land, and still does farming on one hundred acres comprising the home 
place. 

Mr. Hipsle}- has been a life-long Republican and voted for Grant, and 
has done much local work for the party. He was elected to the office of 
county commissioner in 1894 and was re-elected in 1898, so that he was in 
office for six years altogether. All the gravel roads of the county, costing 
in the aggregate six hundred thousand dollars, were constructed during his 
administration. He is a stockholder in the Commercial Bank of Crown 
Point. He affiliates with the Masonic Lodge No. 502 at Hebron. 

Mr. Hipsley married. December 18, 1870, Miss Marilda Dittrick, who 
was born in Lapeer county, ■Michigan, October 12, 1849, '^ daughter of 
Walton and Sarah (Wells) Dittrick. Six children ha\"e been born to them: 
Carrie D., deceased; Alice A., deceased; Sherman J., deceased; Ida F., at 
home; and Lucile M. and Rillia Blanche. Ida was educated in the Con- 
servatory of Music at \'alparaiso. Lucile is in the eighth grade, Blanche in 
the sixth. Mrs. Hipsle}- was four years of age when she came with her 
parents to Marshall county, Indiana, and was reared and educated in that 
county. Her parents are both deceased, and she is the only survixor. Mr. 
and Mrs. Hipsley have in their possession an old parchment deed dated 
August I, 1844. and executed under the hand of President John Tyler. This 
is the eleventh deed of the kind found in the county of Lake. 

CHARLES KEILMANN. 

Charles Keilmann of St. John township is one of the oldest living mem- 
bers of a family which has been prominently identified with the agricultural 



250 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

and business affairs of Lake county since pioneer times. He has himself 
always followed farming, and is still residing on and operating a farm which 
he located upon after his marriage, over a half century ago. Lie has been a 
man of industry and good business habits, has now. at the age of seventy-five, 
a successful career behind him and much to show for his past efforts, and at 
all times and in all circumstances has enjoyed the respect and high esteem 
of his friends and neighbors. 

Mr. Keilmann was born in Hesse-Darmstadt. Germany, August 29, 
1829, being the fourth child of Henr\' and Elizabeth Keilmann, who in 1845 
left their native fatherland and came to Lake county, Indiana, becoming early 
settlers in this portion of northern Indiana. Charles was about sixteen years 
old when he came to this county. He was reared to farm work, and re- 
mained at home and assisted his father until several years after he was 
grown. He was married in 1852, and in the same year located on his present 
farm. He now owns one hundred and twenty acres, and has had a long and 
continued record of success in his operations at farming. He is well known 
throughout the county, and is a truly representative citizen. He is a Demo- 
crat in politics, and served as road commissioner for three terms. He and 
his family are members of the Catholic church in St. John. 

In 1852 Mr. Keilmann married Miss Anna Mary Orr, who was born in 
Germany and was a young girl when she came to Lake county. She died in 
1884, having been the mother of twelve children, ten of whom are living: 
George, deceased; Susanna, wife of Adam Bohling; Frank, of Chicago 
Heights, Illinois; Phillip, of Nebraska; Henry, of Lowell, Indiana; Leonard, 
of Hammond; Michael, who lives at home and married May Dalilkamp; 
Charles, of Dyer, Lake county; John, who died aged fi\-e years; ]\Iary, wife 
of Jacob Spanier, of St. John ; Peter, of Hammond ; and Jacob, of Chicago 
Heights. All these children were born and reared in St. John township. 

LEONARD KEILMAN. 

Leonard Keilman, agriculturist, merchant and general business man of 
Dyer, St. John township, is the foremost man of affairs in this town, and 
has been identified with its commercial prosperity and general development 
for over forty-five years. He belongs to the family which is perhaps the 
most prominent in the industrial and commercial history of St. John town- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 251 

ship, ami its members have played their \arious parts in Lake county for 
tlie past sixty years, from tlie primitive pioneer times to the progressive 
present. INIr. Keihnan has numerous interests, from those purely agricuh- 
ural to financiering and banking, and throughout his career he has been to a 
high degree successful and at the same time has used his influence and 
efforts for the advancement of the community along lines of material, social 
and intellectual good. 

As were the rest of the family, he was born in Hesse-Darmstadt. Ger- 
many, on May 4, 1833, being the youngest of the seven children of Henry 
and Elizabeth Keiliuan, further mention of which worthy pioneer couple 
will be found in the sketches of the \-arious other members of the family 
appearing in this work. When Leonard was seven years old the family 
came to America, and for a little more than four years lived in Portage 
county, Ohio, coming to Lake county in 1844. He was between ele\-en and 
twelve years of age when he arrived in this county, and for se\-eral years 
more attended the early schools of the county. He remained at home with 
his parents until twenty years of age, and then started out for himself by 
engaging in farming. Li 1854 he was luarried, and then at once located 
on the farm where he has ever since made his home, and where he continued 
his farm operations exclusively for several years. In 1858 he branched out 
into the mercantile enterprises which have since occupied so much of his 
attention. He established a store in Dyer and at the same time added a 
lumber yard. About i860 he began the buying and shipping of hay and 
grain, and later took up the milling business at Lowell, where he still owns 
the mill and also the lumber and grain yards and elevators. In 1903 he was 
one of the organizers of the First National Bank at Dyer, and is one of its 
stockholders. His son Henry is its president and a director, and John L. 
Keilman is also a director. Henry Batterman is a director and vice-presi- 
dent. William F. Keilman and John A. Kimmet are the other directors, and 
Augustus Stumel is cashier. The capital stock is twenty-fi\-e thousand 
dollars, and it is already one of the important financial institutions of this 
part of the county. Besides all the enterprises just mentioned, Mr. Keilman 
owns about seven hundred acres of Lake county land. He has taken a good 
citizen's part in the public affairs of his community, and in national affairs 
has always \-oted the Democratic ticket. He and bis family are members 
of the Catholic church. 



252 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

In 1854 Air. Keilmaii married Miss Lena Austgen, who was born in 
Germany and came to America when about twelve years old, locating with 
her family in Lake county during the same year. Mr. and Mrs. Keilman 
are the parents of eight children : Henry, who is a farmer and also men- 
tioned in connection with the bank ; Margaret, wife of J. A. Kimmet. of 
Lowell : Catherine, Mary, both single : Frank, a farmer ; Ellen, a sister in 
St. Joseph's order: John L.. a merchant and in partnership witli his father; 
and Lizzie, single. All the children were Ix^rn in Dyer. 

HAROLD H. WHEELER. 

Pi aminent among th.e energetic and capable young men of Lake county 
is numbered Harold H. W'heeler, who is now clerk of the circuit court and 
a resident of Crown Point. This is his native city, his birth having occurred 
on the 28th of December, 1871. He is the great-grandson of Solon Rol> 
inson, who was the first county clerk of Lake county and was the founder of 
Crown Point. He became one of the veiy earliest settlers of this portion of 
the state, locating here when much of the land was still in its primitive con- 
dition, when the forests \\ere uncut, the prairies uncultivated. 

John J. ^^'heeler, the father of our subject, is represented elsewhere in 
this work. In his family were four children, of whom Harold H. Wheeler 
is the eldest son. The latter was educated in the high school of Crown 
Point and immediately after leaving school he accepted the position of 
deputy clerk under George I. Maillet, under whom he served for three years. 
He was then deput}- clerk for George M. Eder for eight years and at the end 
of that time was nominated without opposition at the Republican ])rimaries 
for the position of clerk of the circuit court, in 1900. His election followed 
and he discharged the duties so acceptably that in 1902 he was re-nominated, 
and he now has five years to serve. His second term began in January, 1904. 
His connection w'ith the office has been of long duration, so that he is thor- 
oughly familiar with the business transactions therein and he has instituted 
many reforms and improvements, which have been of value in the system 
of conducting the work of the office of the clerk of the circuit court. 

Mr. \\'heeler is identified with several fraternal organizations. He 
belongs to the Independent Order of Foresters, the Benevolent and Protect- 
ive Ordef of Elks, the Knights of Pythias fraternity and is a prominent 





yjLAr 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 253 

Mason, always true and loyal to the teachings of the craft. He belongs 
to the lilue lodge, chapter, council and commandery, also to the lodge of 
Perfection of the Rose Croix and has attained the thirty-second degree of 
the Scottish Rite. He is likewise identified with the Mystic Shrine, and is 
very active in the work of the fraternity, while in his life he exemplifies the 
beneficent spirit of the craft. 

In 1891 he was united in marriage to ]\Iiss Jennie \\'ard, a daughter 
of Henry P. Ward, and they h.ave one son, John Ward Wheeler. Mr. 
Wheeler has a very wide acquaintance throughout the county in which his 
entire life has been passed, and his election to ottice was a tribute to liis per- 
sonal worth as well as to his business ability. 

WILLIA^I H. VANSCIVER. 

^^'illiam H. Vansciver, a retired farmer residing in Crown Point, was 
born at Beverly, New Jersey, December 25, 1852, and is of Holland lineage. 
His paternal grandfather was \\'illiam Vansciver, his father, Barnet Van- 
sciver. The latter was a native of New Jersey, acquired his education in the 
schools of that state and was married there to Miss Anna Horner, who was 
born and reared in Pennsylvania. Their only child, William H. Vansciver, 
was a year old when in 1S53 they came to Lake county, Indiana, settling on 
a farm in Winfield township, where the father carried on agricultural pursuits 
until sixty-eight years of age, when his life's labors were ended in death. 

Upon the old family homestead William H. \'ansciver spent the days 
of his boyhood and youth, and his education was acquired in the common 
schools. As soon as old enough he assisted in the work of field and meadow, 
and later he took charge of the home farm, continuing its cultivation and 
management for many years. In fact, throughout his entire Lousiness career 
he has carried on agricultural pursuits, and he is now the owner (jf two hun- 
dred and twentj^-eight acres of valuable land in Winfield townsiiip. which he 
rents, this bringing to him a good income. He is now practically living 
retired from active business life, although occasionally he assists in selling 
agricultural implements. 

Mr. Vansciver was united in marriage to Miss Kate Patton, who was 
born in Ohio and was a daughter of James Patton. She was reared in Lake 
county, Indiana, and by this marriage there were four children. Init two 



254 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

died in early life. The others are Delia and Dana. Both Mr. and Mrs. Van- 
sciver are well known in this county and have a large circle of warm friends. 
He exercises his right of franchise in support of the men and measures of 
the Republican party, has taken an active interest in political work in his 
locality and keeps well informed on the questions and issues of the day. He 
served as township trustee of Winfield township for nine years, and he has 
always been interested in public progress and improvement. He is identified 
with the Masonic lodge and with the Foresters at Crown Point, and he con- 
tributes generously to different churches, although he is not identified with 
any denomination through membership relations. His life has been quietly 
passed, yet it contains many elements that are well worthy of emulation, for 
he has always been active and honorable in business, loyal in citizenship and 
faithful in friendship. 

DAVID A. FISHER. 

David A. Fisher, of Section 29, Eagle Creek township, has been among 
the leading farmers of this part of Lake county for the past twenty years, and 
carries on his operations on an unusually extensive scale. He is a native son 
of the county and township, arid most of the years of a very busy and suc- 
cessful business career have been spent here. Besides farming, he has at 
\'arious times branched nut into commercial lines, where he has likewise lieen 
prosperous, and in citizenship and matters of community interest he performs 
his part in a public-spirited and generous manner. 

^Ir. Fisher was born in Eagle Creek township, Lake county, March 13, 
1855, and was reared and educated in the county. From the public schools 
he went to Valparaiso and took a course in the Northern Indiana Normal 
School. For two years he was engaged in the hardware and implement busi- 
ness at Hebron, during 1882-83. In 1884 he returned to the farm, where 
he has found his pleasantest and most profitable scene of work. He has done 
general farming and stock-raising, and has the management of five hundred 
and ninety-five acres, with four men in his employ. During 1902 and 1903 
he was once more in the implement business, selling binders, mowers and 
other farm machinery manufactured liy the Piano Company. For some 
months in 1879-80 he was in Colorado for his health, and during the winter 
was engaged in freighting from Colorado Springs and Leadville, and he also 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 255 

spent a part of the same winter in New ^Mexico. Mr. Fisher is one of the 
influential Republicans in local affairs, and served his townsliip as trustee 
from 1886 to 1890. He affiliates with the Masonic lodge No. 502 at Hebron 
and the Independent Order of Foresters at Hebron. 

In 1876 jNIr. Fisher married Aliss Elizalieth Bliss, and for their wedding 
journev thev attended the Centennial at Philadelphia. ]\Irs. Fisher was Ijorn 
in New- York state and was reared in Pulaski county, Indiana. They are the 
parents of two sons: Kenneth ^^'illiam and ^^'inford B. Kcnnetli has re- 
ceived his diploma from the public schools in the class of 1902 and will take 
an extended course in schools of higher instruction. Winford married, June 
II, 1903, I\Iiss Lilly B. Volkee, of Eagle Creek township. 

AUGUST KOEHLE. 

August Koehle, proprietor of the Spring Hill resort at St. John, was 
Ixjrn in Germany on the 3d of October, 1853, and came to America in 1871, 
being at that time eighteen years of age. He settled first in Cliicago, where 
he W'as employed by a brewing company, remaining in that city for about 
five years or until 1876, when he went to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. There 
he visited the Centennial Exposition and later returned to Chicago, Init the 
same year came to Lake county, settling first at Crown Point. There he 
worked for the Crown Point Brewing Company and was made foreman of 
the plant, for his previous experience and comprehensive knowledge of the 
business well qualified him for this position, which he filled in an acceptable 
manner for about four years. On the expiration of that period, wdth the 
money which he had saved from his earnings, he established a saloon in 
Crown Point, conducting it for six months. On the expiration of that 
period he came to St. John, where be erected a building and carried on a 
saloon for some time. Later, however, he sold out and established iiis 
present resort called the Spring Hill Grove. This is a summer resort, con- 
tains fine buildings and all modern equipments to promote the pleasure of the 
general public. Everything is in first-class condition and the place was 
buih at a great expense. He has good bowling alleys here and has a resort 
which is well patronized and brings to him a good financial return ujjon liis 
investment. 



256 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

On the 13th of June, 1878, Mr. Koehle was united in marriage to Miss 
Anna Smith, and to them has been born a son, \\'iniam. In his pohtical 
affiHations Mr. Koehle is a Democrat, active in support of die party, and he 
now has charge of the stone roads in St. John township. He is well known 
in this part of the county and is deeply interested in its welfare and sub- 
stantial upbuilding. He and his family are members of the Catholic church 
of St. John. He has never had occasion to regret his determination to seek 
a home in America, for here he has found the business opportunities which 
he sought, and through close application, energy and untiring efifort he has 
passed from humble surroundings and has become one of the well-to-do 
citizens of his community. 

HERBERT E. JOXES. 

Herbert E. Jones, who is serving for the third term as city clerk of 
East Chicago, was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, on the 23d of July, 1866, 
his parents being John T. and Mary (Jones) Jones, both of v.hom were 
natives of Wales. The paternal grandfather, John Jones, was also born in 
Wales, was an iron worker by trade and coming to America was identified 
with the iron industry of Pennsylvania. He died in Pittsburg, that state, 
when more than eighty years of age. The maternal grandfather of Mr. 
Jones, also a native of \\'ales, spent his entire life in that little rock-ribbed 
country, dying in middle life. He had made farming his occupation. His 
widow married again, becoming" the wife of a minister. 

John T. Jones followed in the business footsteps of his father and 
became an iron worker. He emigrated to .America about 185 1 and located 
in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, making his home in that state until 1866. when 
he went to Knoxville, Tennessee, continuing to reside there and in the 
neighborhood of Chattanooga until 1873, when he removed to Portland, 
Maine. .Vtout seven years were passed in that city, at the expiration of 
which period he took up his abode in Chicago, Illinois, where he continued 
until 1889, when he removed to East Chicago. Here he spent his remaining 
days, passing away in 1897, when seventy-one years of age. His wife had 
departed this life about six months before, in July, 1896, at the age of sixty- 
nine years. They were members of the Congregational church. Their 
family numbered ten children, five sons and five daughters, of whom four 





(5NN.3-^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 257 

are now living: John A., a resident of East Cliicago ; Mary, the wife of 
John P. Hickman, of Milwankee, Wisconsin; Herbert E., of East Chicago; 
Daniel, who is also living in East Chicago. 

In taking up the personal history of Herbert E. Jones we present to 
our readers the life record of one who is now widely and fax'orably known in 
East Chicago. Born soon after the removal of his parents to Knoxville, 
Tennessee, he spent the first seven j-ears of his life in that state and then 
accompanied his parents to Portland, Maine. His education was acquired 
in the public schools. \\'lien lie was thirteen years of age he began to earn 
his own living by working in a rolling mill, thus following the occupation 
which had iDeen the life labor of his ancestors through several generations. 
He continued in that pursuit for a number of years, and in the meantime 
had become a resident, first of Chicago and then of East Chicago. Finally, 
however, he abandoned the iron industry to accept the position of city clerk, 
in 1898, and by popular franchise he has been continued in the office for 
three terms. His re-elections are certainly indicative of his methodical, 
systematic and accurate work in the oftice and of his unfaltering fidelity to 
duty. In March, 1904, he was nominated for the office of recorder of Lake 
county. 

On the 1st of September, 1S96, occurred the marriage of Mr. Jones 
and Miss Mary Jenkins, a daughter of Richard and Mary Jenkins, and they 
are now the parents of two children — Agnes and Herbert. Mr. and Mrs. 
Jones are consistent members of the Congregational church. They reside 
at 4222 Magoun avenue, where he has recently erected a comfortable home. 
Fraternally he is connected with East Chicago Lodge No. 595, F. & A. M., 
was formerly its master and is now filling the position of secretary. He 
also belongs to East Chicago Lodge No. 677, I. O. O. F., to the Benevolent 
Protective Order of Elks, the Knights of the Maccabees and the Modern 
Woodmen of America. His political allegiance is given to the Republican 
partv. his study of the questions and issues of the day and of the attitude of 
the two parties respecting these leading him to give a loyal support to Repub- 
lican principles, and it was upon the ticket of tliat party that he has been 
three times chosen to the position of city clerk. 



25S HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

FREDERICK LASH. 

Frederick Lash, the popular and successful proprietor of the Erie Hotel 
and Restaurant at Hammond, Indiana, has been numbered among the busi- 
ness men of this city since 1890. He has lived in the state of Indiana since 
the late sixties, taking up his residence here after a brilliant record as a 
soldier in both the volunteer and regular forces of the United States, and in 
his private career since that time he has been as successful, as enterprising 
and public-spirited as when he followed the flag of the nation. He has a 
permanent place in the regard of the citizens of Hammond, and has ne\'er 
been known to shirk the responsibilities of private, social or pulilic life. 

]\Ir. Lash was born in Berks county, Pennsylvania, December 19, 1843, 
being the only son of Benjamin and Elizabeth (Hummel) Lash, natives of 
Germany. His paternal grandfather, John Lash, was a native of Germany, 
was a baker by trade and also served in the regular army, and died in that 
country at the age of ninety-five years, having been the father of a good-sized 
family, mostly sons. Benjamin Lash was also a baker by trade, and followed 
that pursuit after emigrating to America and taking up his residence in 
Berks county, Pennsylvania. FIc died there in 1849, aged seventy-five years. 
His wife's father Hummel died in Germany, and that part of the family 
history is lost. 

]\Ir. Frederick Lash was reared in Berks county, Pennsylvania, on a 
farm, and the school which he remembers having attended was in a log cabin. 
He was at home until the summons of war went out through the land, and 
as a boy of about seventeen he enlisted, in 1861, in the First New York 
Artillery. He was in the conflict from almost the very beginning to the 
end, and entered as a private and was gradually promoted to the captaincy 
of his company, being of that rank at the close of the war. He was in the 
battles of Lookout Mountain, Fredericksburg, Vicksburg, Missionary Ridge 
and the Wilderness, and was all through the Atlanta campaign. He was 
slightly wounded at \'icksburg. After the war he ser\-ed three years in the 
regular army, being stationed most of the time in the eastern states, princi- 
pally in New York. 

Following his army service, he came to Indiana and engaged in the 
restaurant busines in Lafayette for some years. He conducted a restaurant, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 259 

bakery and confectionery establishment at Attica, Indiana, until 1890. and 
in that year came to Hammond, where he has been in the restaurant and 
hotel business ever since, for the past twelve years having had charge of the 
Erie Hotel, one of the most popular public liouses of the city, owing all its 
prosperity to the excellent management of Mr. Lash. 

Mr. Lash was married in March, 1869, to Miss Elizabeth Lahr, a 
daughter of Ulrich and Julia Lahr. There were two children of this union, 
William and Frederick, the former being a clerk in Hammond and a married 
man. while the latter is single. Airs. Elizabetli Lash died April 8. 1899. On 
May 2, 1900, Mr. Lash married Miss Elizabeth Mclntyre, a daughter of 
James P. and Eliza Jane (Forrest) Mclntyre. Mr. and Mrs. Nash are Epis- 
copalians in faith, although not identified with any church. He is a Repub- 
lican in politics, and is alderman from the Third ward. He afifiliates with 
Garfield Lodge No. 569, F. & A. Yi.. with Hammond Chapter, R. A. M., and 
Bethlehem Temple of the Mystic Shrine in Chicago, and he and his wife 
are members of the Eastern Star. He also belongs to Moltke Lodge. 
I. O. O. F.. and to the Ancient Order of United Workmen. He is a member 
of the William H. Calkins Post No. 549, G. A. R. For ten years he was 
commander of the Indiana State Guard, and was elected colonel of the Lake 
County Brigade, G. A. R., in 1900. He is the owner of several houses and 
lots in Hammond, and his material prosperity has come to him as the results 
of his own efforts. He is a self-made man, and well deserves the place of 
esteem which he has gained by a life of endeavor. 

Mrs. Lash's grandfather, James Mclntyre, was of Irish lineage, but 
was born in the north of Scotland. He married Mary Booth, of pure Eng- 
lish stock, and they had eleven children. He came to America in young man- 
hood and settled in Vermont, where he died at the age of seventy-three years. 
His fatlier, also named James, died in Ireland. Mary (Booth) Mclntyre died 
in Vermont at the age of seventy years. 

The parents of Mrs. Lash were natives of Vermont, and lived at St. 
Albans Bay. They had two children : Elizabeth and Edgar Forrest Mc- 
lntyre. James P. Mclntyre, her father, was a molder by trade, and had a 
business of his own. He settled in Jackson, IMichigan, at an early dav, and 
thence moved to Athens, and from there to Three Rivers, in the same state, 
where he had a large plow factoiy. He returned to \'ermont, but later came 



260 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

to Baldwin, Wisconsin, and from there to Stillwater, and thence to Eau 
Claire, Wisconsin, where he had extensi\'e plow works. He later took up 
his residence in Chicago, which is his present home. His wife died in 1869. 
She was a member of the Methodist church. Her father, William Forrest, 
came to Vermont from Canada, and he and his wife Eliza had a large family. 
Mr. Mclntyre was a soldier in the Civil war, belonging to Company I, Ver- 
mont Infantry, and served four years, having been enlisted as a private and 
mustered out a.s a colonel. He was once woundefl in the forehead liy a shell. 
He married for his second wife Louisa Amelia Stannard, and they had nine 
children, five sons and four daughters, the five now living beirig Frank E., 
James H., Archie R., Sarah J. and Belle, all of Chicago. 

JOHN STEPHENS. 

John Stephens, as superintendent of the Inland Steel Company at Indiana 
Harbor, is a prominent factor in the industrial development an.d substantial 
growth of northwestern Indiana, and his career is one which excites the 
admiration and awakens the respect of all who know aught of his life history. 
To a student of biography there is nothing more interesting than to examine 
the life history of a self-made man, and to detect the elements of character 
which have enabled him to pass on the highway of life man>' of the com- 
panions of his youth who at the outset of their careers were more advan- 
tageously equipped or endowed. Mr. Stephens has through his own exertions 
attained an honorable position and marked prestige among the representative 
men of this state, and with signal consistency it may be said that he is the 
architect of his own fortunes, and one whose success amply justifies the 
application of the somewhat hackneyed but most expressive title of "a self- 
made man." 

Mr. Stephens was born in Lydney, Gloucestershire, England, December 
2, 1844, and is a son of John and Charlotte (Hawkens) Stephens, both of 
whom were natives of Lydney. The paternal grandfather also i)ore the name 
of John Stephens, and he too was born in Lydney. He was a mill worker, 
connected with the tin industry, and he died at the advanced age of ninety- 
two years, while his wife, Mrs. Hannah Stephens, died at the age of seventy- 
four years. Tiiey were the parents of three sons and four daughters. The 
maternal grandparents of our subject were Samuel and Sarah Hawkens, and 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 261 

were native residents of Lydney, where the latter died at the age of forty-two 
years, while the former reached the \enerahle age of eighty-nine years. He 
was a shipping contractor, loading and unloading vessels as they came into 
the canal and dock, or preparing them for passage at sea. To him and his 
wife were born a son and a daughter, the latter becoming the wife of John 
Stephens, the father of Mr. Stephens of this review. John Stephens, 2d, 
was a hammerman and lived" and died in his native town of Lydney, where 
his death occurred in 1899, wben he was seventy-seven years of 'jge. His wife 
departed this life in J\Larch, 1902, when se\'enty-six years of age. Both were 
members of the Methodist church. They had hut two children, the daughter, 
Sarah, being the wife of Lot Malsom, of Sharon, Pennsylvania. 

Mr. John Stephens spent the days of his boyhood and youth in Lydney, 
England, and accjuired his education in the public schools there. \Mien six- 
teen years of age he became identified with the industry wdiich he has made 
his life work, securing employment in an iron foundry. There he became 
familiar with the business in every department, and in detail as well as prin- 
ciple. He worked in both the tin and sheet-iron departments, gaining a most 
practical and comprehensive knowdedge of the trade, and thus he was well 
ecjuipped for advancement along that line when he came to America. 

Believing that the new world offered better business advantages, Mr. 
Stephens, on the 22d of February, 1872, left England for America, landing 
in New York city on the 9th of March. The same day he went to Oxford. 
New Jersey, arriving there at half past six o'clock in the evening. He ciin- 
tinued in Oxford until the following August, when he removed 10 Catasaucjua, 
Pennsylvania, where he remained for ten months, and then located at Sharon, 
Pennsylvania, where he resided for eleven years, actively connected with the 
iron industry at that place. His next home was in Greenville, Pennsylvania, 
and two years later he went to Newcastle, in the same state, where he lived 
for five years. On the expiration of that period he returned to Sharon, where 
he remained for seven years longer. For eighteen years he was in the 
employ of P. L. Kimberly & Company, and during tlie last seven years with 
the Sharon Iron Company, being its superintendent. On leaving Pennsvl- 
vania. he removed to iNIuncie, Indiana, where he took charge of the plant of 
the Midland Steel Company, with which he was connected for six and a half 
years. From ]Muncie he came to Indiana Harbor, on the ist of March, 1902, 



262 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

and in company with R. J. Beatty. John McGrath, John G. Dauks, R. W. 
Wick and some Chicago capitaHsts, including L. E. Block, P. D. Block and 
others, built the Inland Steel Mill, which now employs alxjut nine hundred 
and fifty men. and this number will be increased as the work progresses. 
The output of the plan^t has reached very extensive proportions and it is 
destined to become one of the leading industrial concerns of the middle west. 
Throughout his business career Mr. Stephens has been connected with great 
productive industries, in which he has gradually worked his way upward 
through efficiency, skill and practical knowledge, until he stands today as 
one of the foremost representatives of the iron industry in Indiana. More- 
over, throughout the entire period of his business career he has ever sus- 
tained a reputation which is unassailable, and while fully guarding the inter- 
ests of his company he has also been most just and fair in his dealings with 
those who have worked under him, and no better proof of both statements 
can be given than the fact that he has received from both employers and 
fellow-employes substantial tokens of their trust and esteem for him. 

When Mr. Stephens left Newcastle. Pennsylvania, the employes of the 
mill there made him a present of a handsome gold watch and chain, a set of 
gold cuff buttons and a pair of fancy slippers, while the company gave him 
a purse of twenty-seven dollars and a rocking chair. \Mien he left Sharon, 
Pennsylvania, the employes gave him a full set of the Encyclopedia Britan- 
nica and a rocking chair for himself and one for his wife. When he left 
Muncie the employes gave him a three-hundred-dollar silver set, and these 
tokens of kindly regard and good will he justly prizes highly. 

On the 14th of October, 1865. Mr. Stephens was united in marriage 
to Miss Hannah Jones, a daughter of Herbert and Hannah Jones, and to 
them have been born the following children, five sons and five daughters : 
Emily. Caroline Charlotte. Frederick J. H.. Lillie Hannah, Minnie Maude, 
William Charles, Francis Eusebius. Mabel. Harold and Clairmont. Emily 
is now the wife of Edwin Hoke, of Lidiana Harbor, and they have two cliil- 
dren, Emma and Beulah. Frederick J. H. Stephens married Miss Laura 
Halstock, of Muncie, Indiana. Lillie Hannah is the wife of Walter Dang, 
of Indiana Harbor. 

Mr. and Mrs. Stephens arc jjrominent. influential and active members 
of the Methodist Episcopal church, and he is serving as a member of the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 263 

board of trustees and also as superintendent of the Sunday school. He is a 
local minister. lia\-ing lieen licensed to preach thirty-four years ago. Politi- 
cally he is a Republican. He built in 1902 the largest residence in Indiana 
Harlxjr, on the lake front. Possessing strong domestic tastes, his interest 
largely centers in his family, and he counts no sacrifice on his part too great 
that will enhance the welfare or promote the happiness of his wife and 
children. The church, too, claims considerable of his attention, and while in 
his business career he has steadily advanced, he has always found time to 
discharge his duties to his fellow-men and his obligations of citizenship. 

CHARLES M. BAKER. 

Charles M. Baker, who is proprietor and successfully conducts a large 
livery, feed and sales stable at Crown Point, is a business man who can 
point with much pride and satisfaction to his career of self-achievement cul- 
minating in a sulistantial place in the business circles of Crown Point and 
in the esteem of his fellow-citizens and associates. He has practically hewn 
out his own destiny and been the architect of his own fortune since he was 
a lad of few years and with little preparation such as most boys enjoy. From 
various experiences in varied lines of activity he has progressed gradually 
but surely, and is now able to claim one of the very best establishments of 
its kind in Lake county, with a constantly growing patronage as evidence of 
the excellence of his teams and equipments and methods of doing business. 

Mr. Baker was born in Porter county, Indiana, March 26, 1866, a son 
of Justice and Eunice (Allen) Baker, the former a native of New York 
state. He was four years old when he lost his mother, and fi\-e years old 
when he lost his father, and their individual histories are not easily recalled. 
Mr. Baker has one brother, George, of Boone Grove, Porter county, and 
three sisters: Lydia, wife of Noah Merriman, of ]\Iarion, Indiana; Jennie, 
wife of James Lewis, of Champaign, Illinois: and Emma, who is the widow 
of Alfred T. Cofifin and lives in Crown Point. 

Mr. Baker, thus left an orphan before he was of an age to attend school, 
was deprived of many circumstances of rearing that most children have. At 
the age of nine he was bound out to a man with whom he remained three 
years, and then started out on bis individual career. He worked by the day 
and month at anything he could find. He clerked in a store in Crown Point 



264 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

for some time, and also spent two years as a clerk for the H. P. Stanley- 
Fruit Company in Chicago. For se\eral years after that he was engaged 
in various lines of enterprise in Crown Point, which has been the scene of 
most of his efforts since arriving at years of manhood. In 1900 he bought 
the livery stock of Charles Wilson, and in 1903 he built his present barn, 
thirty-eight by one hundred and forty feet. He keeps twenty-six head of 
good horses, and has the reputation of sending out the best rigs in town. 

Mr. Baker is one of the public-spirited citizens of Crown Point, and 
has served on the town board and as one of the trustees of Crown Point. 
He is stanch in his adherence to the Republican party. He affiliates with the 
Independent Order of Foresters. In connection with the livery business he 
also buys and sells horses, and up to 1902 he was engaged in the hay business. 

Mr. Baker married, in 1887, Miss Adah Holton, the daughter of Janna 
S. and Catherine J. (Eddy) Holton, who were Lake county pioneers. Mrs. 
Baker was born in this count}-, September 14. 1867, and was educated at 
Crown Point, finishing in the high school. She died February 16, 1904, 
when in her thirtv-seventh vear. There are three sons and one daup-hter 
of the family: Harry ].. Ijorn in 1889: Fay M., born in 1892: Lewis C, bom 
in 1895 ; and Howard H., born in 1897. 

F. RICHARD SCHAAF, Jr. 

F. Richard Schaaf, Jr., is filling the position of bookkeeper with the 
Standard Oil Company and is an expert accountant. He also owns valuable 
real estate in Robertsdale, and is a director of the First National Bank of 
Whiting. While his life histoi-y is characterized by no exciting incidents, it, 
nevertheless, proves the value of activity, energy and reliability in the affairs 
of life and shows that the young man may occupy positions of great trust 
and responsibility. 

Mr. Schaaf was born on the 15th of April, 1878, in Hamburg, Ger- 
many. His father, F. Richard Schaaf, Sr., was a native of Saxony, Ger- 
many, was reared and married there. Miss Catherine Schlueter becoming his 
wife. Her birth occurred near Hamburg. In the year 1880 thev left the 
fatherland and with their family sailed for the new world, taking up their 
abode in Chicago. Mr. Schaaf, Sr., is a I)!acksmith by trade, but in Chicago 
engaged in the hotel business. In 1890 he removed to Whiting, where he 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 265 

also established a hotel, which he conducted for about five years. On tlie 
expiration of that period he went to Robertsdale, a suburb of Hammond, 
Indiana, where he engaged in the grocery business and also became a real 
estate and insurance agent. Both he and his wife are still living in North 
Hammond and are well known there. They are the parents of seven chil- 
dren and with one exception all are yet living. 

F. Richard Schaaf, Jr., is the eldest child and was only about two years 
of age when brought to the United States. His education was acquired in 
the public schools of Chicago and in Bryant & Stratton's Business College 
of that city. In 1898 he became an employe of the Western Newspaper 
Syndicate of Chicago, continuing in that service for about seven months, 
when he was offered the position as bookkeeper by the Standard Oil Com- 
pany at Whiting. His efficiency won him promotion to the position of head 
bookkeeper of the parafiin department si.x months after he had become an 
employe of the corporation. He is likewise a director of the First National 
Bank at Whiting and he owns a large amount of real estate in Robertsdale, 
having made judicious investments in property, from which he has already 
realized good returns. 

Mr. Schaaf is well known in political circles in northwestern Indiana, 
and when he was but twenty-one years of age he was elected a delegate to 
the Republican state con\'ention held at Indianapolis in 1900. He was also 
elected a member of the county central committee and made vice chairman 
of the city central committee of Hammond, Indiana. In the spring of 1904 
he was nominated for trustee of North township. He is also president of 
the Robertsdale fire department, having filled this position for six years. 

On the 1 2th of June, 1901. Mr. Schaaf was united in marriage to Miss 
Mary A. Roberts, a daughter of Mrs. Agnes Roberts of Robertsdale, and 
they are well known in Lake county, where tliey have many friends. Fra- 
ternally Mr. Schaaf is connected with the Masons, belonging to Whiting 
Lodge No. 613, F. & A. M., of which he is now treasurer. He is also a 
member of the Modern Woodmen of America. He is a man of considerable 
influence, aiding in molding public thought, action and opinion. The inter- 
ests which liave made claim iqion his time and attention ha\'e lieen such as 
tend to the betterment of the conditions of mankind and for the stimulus 
of material progress or the inipro\'ement of the city. 



266 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

ROBERT SPEAR. M. D. 

During the seven years which mark the period of liis professional career 
Dr. Robert Spear has met with gratifying success. Throughout this time he 
has made his home in East Chicago, wliere he has won the good will and 
patronage of many of the best citizens. He is a thorough student and 
endeavors to keep abreast of the times in everything relating to the dis- 
coveries in medical science. Progressive in his ideas and favoring modern 
methods as a whole, he does not dispense with the time-tried systems whose 
value has stood the test of years. 

Dr. Spear was born in Cobourg, Ontario, Canada, January 23, 1868, 
and is of Scotch lineage. His paternal grandfather, Thomas Spear, was 
a native of Scotland and thence emigrated to Canada, where he followed the 
carpenter's trade. He was twice married and by the first imion had one son,. 
\\'illiam, who reached mature years, while the three other children died in 
their teens. For his second wife he chose Miss McComb, and they had one 
daughter who died in childhood. William Spear, a native of Ontario, Canada, 
learned and followed the wagon-builder's trade in early manhood and after- 
ward turned his attention to farming. He, too, was twice married, first 
wedding Miss Sarah Davidson, by whom he had four children, of whom 
three are now living, namely: Thomas, of Cobourg, Canada: \\'illiam K., 
also of Cobourg: and David, of Pipestone, Manitoba. Their daughter, 
Elizabeth, is deceased. After the death of his first wife William Spear 
married Miss Margaret Brown, also a native of Ontario, and they became 
the parents of nine children, three sons and six daughters, of whom eight 
are now living, as follows: James, of Cobourg: Annie, also of Cobourg; 
Agnes, of Virden, Manitoba: Dr. Robert Spear: Andrew, of Cobourg; 
Margaret, of Rochester, New York: Christina, of Cobourg; a:id Isabell, of 
Wilton, North Dakota. Jennie died at the age of twenty-one years. The 
father of this family passed away at Cobourg, Canada, in 1901, at the age of 
seventy-five years, and is still survived by his widow, who is a devoted Chris- 
tian woman, holding membership in the Presbyterian church, to which her 
husband also belonged. She was a daughter of Robert Brown, a native of 
Scotland, who crossing the Atlantic took up his abode in Canada, where he 
followed the occupation of farming. He married a ]\Iiss IMiller. and they 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 267 

reared a large family of nine children. His death occurred when he was ahout 
eighty years of age. 

Dr. Robert Spear spent his boyhood days in the usual manner of farmer 
lads, remaining under the parental roof near Cobourg. In the summer 
months he assisted in the work of the fields and in the winter seasons attended 
the district school. Later he continued his education in the collegiate insti- 
tute at Cobourg, and subsequently entered Queen's University at Kingston. 
In order to prepare for the practice of medicine he became a student in the 
Trinity Medical College, of Toronto, from which institution he was grad- 
uated W'ith the class of 1897. He then began practice in East Cliicago, estab- 
lishing his home in this city on the ist of May of that year. Here he has 
remained continuously since, and his skill and ability are indicated by the 
patronage which is accorded him. He has always been a close and earnest 
student of hi.-; pmfession and his efforts are beneficially put forth for the 
alleviation of human suffering. 

On the 6tli of October, 1897, Dr. Spear was united in marriage to Miss 
Minnie Cook, a daughter of John and ]^Iartha (Sykes) Cook. Two children 
have been born of this union. \\'ilfred Garnet and Helen Gladys. Dr. and 
Mrs. Spear are Presbyterians in their religious faith, and in politics he is 
somewhat independent. In May, 1904. he was elected to represent the First 
ward in the City Council of the city of East Chicago. His professional con- 
nection is with the Lake County Medical Society, the Kankakee Valley 
Medical Society, the Indiana State Medical Association and the American 
Medical Association. He resides at No. 4530 Forsyth street, where he 
erected a good home in 1901. 

GEORGE M. EDER. 

George M. Eder, cigar manufacturer at J05 South Hohmar. street, Ham- 
mond, has been a successful business man in Lake county for a number of 
years, having learned his trade when a boy and having begun the manu- 
facture of cigars in Crown Point about thirty years ago. There is a large 
and steady demand for all the goods that he can produce, and his output has 
gained him Cjuite a reputation. Before coming to Hammond he held a numljer 
of important local ofifices, and his public-spirited interest in general affairs 
and his loyalty to home, city and state mark him out as a representative 



268 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

citizen as he is also a man of highest integrity and sterhng personal worth. 

^Ir. Eder was born in Landau, Bavaria, German)', April 22, 1855. His 
paternal grandfather, IMartin Eder. was a farmer and died in Germany when 
an old man. By his wife. Mary Eder. he had seven sons and one daughter. 
Mr. Eder's maternal grandfather died in Germany during middle life, and 
his wife, Theressa Huber, lived to the great age of ninety-six years, they 
having been the parents of only one child, the mother of Mr. Eder. 

Mr. Eder's parents were John B. and Theressa (Huber) Eder, both 
natives of Germany. His father was a laborer in the fatherland, and later 
served for twelve years in the Bavarian army. He came to America in 1855. 
locating in Chicago, where he followed various pursuits. He was burned out 
at the Chicago fire in 1871, and in 1873 moved to Crown Point, Indiana, 
where he died February 3, 1877, aged sixty-nine years. His wife survived 
him and died at the age of eighty-two. They were both Catholics. There 
were three sons and one daughter in their family, and the two !iow living are 
Joseph, of Crown Point, and George M., of Hammond. 

Mr. George M. Eder was in infancy when his parents crossed the ocean 
to America. He was reared in Chicago, where he attended the public and 
parochial schools and learned the cigarmaker's trade, and lived there until 
1873, ■^vhen he accompanied the rest of the family to Crown Point. He 
engaged in the manufacture of cigars at the county seat until his election, 
in 1890, to the office of county clerk, which position he occupied for two 
terms, or eight years. In May, 1903, he moved to Hammond and resumed 
the manufacture of cigars. He owns his nice home at 205 South Hohman 
street, where is also located his factory. ^Mr. Eder is a stockholder in the 
Commercial Bank of Crown Point, and for five years was vice-president 
of the bank. 

I\lr. Eder was town clerk and treasurer of Crown Point lor six 3-ears, 
and was twice elected township trustee, resigning that office after three years 
in order to accept the county clerkship. He has fraternal affiliations with 
the Catholic Order of Foresters and the Independent Order of Foresters. 
He and his wife are members of the Catholic church. 

September 24, 1878, Air. Eder married l\Iiss Frances M. Scherer, a 
daughter of Peter and Catherine (Young) Scherer. There are seven chil- 
dren of this union, George J., Edward J., Clarence AI., Louis G., Rose M.. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 69 

Daniel and Florence. George J- is in the employ of the American Express 
Company; Edward J- is a lawyer in Hammond; Clarence Xi. clerks in a 
grocery store in East Chicago ; Louis G. is attending college in Chicago ; 
and the other three are in the public schools of Hammond. 

CLARENCE C. SMITH. 

Clarence C. Smith is a member of the firm of Smith & Clapper Brothers, 
liven-men at East Chicago, Indiana, and was born in [Mason, ^Michigan, on 
the 5th of October, 1863. His paternal grandfather was a native of New 
York and was a farmer by occupation, but aside from that little is known 
concerning the ancestn.^ of the house in the paternal line. Gideon Smith, 
the father of C. C. Smith, was born in the Empire state and became a boot 
and shoe maker. He followed that occupation in the east for a time and 
then abandoned it and removed to the middle west, locating in Michigan 
about 1862. He took up his abode at Mason, that state, where he remained 
until 1864, when he came to Lake county, Indiana, and settled one mile west 
of Deep River postofiice, where he purchased what was known as the Ed 
Chase farm There he carried on agricultural pursuits and also worked at 
his trade to some extent. He lived a life of untiring activity and industry, 
and whatever success he achieved was due solely to his own labors. He 
married Airs. Anna L. Hanna, ncc Marble, who was the widow of Thomas 
Hanna and a daughter of Simeon Marble, who was born in Vermont, which 
was also her birthplace. Mr. Marble followed the occupation of farming in 
New England and on emigrating w^tward about 1858 he IvKated a mile 
and a half west of Deep Ri\'er postoffice, where he purchased what was 
known as the Booth farm. There he carried on the work of tilling the soil 
throughout his remaining days, and his death occurred when he was seventv- 
five years of age. He was married five times, his first union being with a 
Miss Imes. He had but three children, all born by his first wife: Ann L.. 
who became Mrs. Smith : Horace Marble, who is living at Crown Point and 
Wheatfield, Indiana: and one that has now departed this life. Both Mr. 
and Mrs. Gideon Smith were members of the Methodist church and lived 
earnest, consistent Christian lives. Her death occurred in Hobart. Indiana, 
about 1880. when she was thirty-nine years of age, and Mr. Gideon Smith 
passed away in December, igo2, in East Chicago, at the age of eighty-two 



270 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

years. Mr. and Mrs. Gideon Smith were the parents of six children, three 
sons and three daughters, of wliom five are now Hving: Eva. the wife of 
Henry Hanson, of Chicago: Clarence C. who is living in East Chicago; 
Flora, the wife of George Green, also of East Chicago: Simeon, who makes 
his home in Hammond, Indiana : and Alice, the wife of S. G. Carley, of 
Hammond. 

Clarence C. Smith was reared in the usual manner of farmer lads, partly 
spending his boyhood days on the old homestead place west of Deep River. 
As soon as old enough to handle the plow he took his place in the fields and 
assisted in their culti\'ation from the time of early spring planting until 
crops were harvested in the late autumn. His education was acquired in the 
district schools, which he attended mostly through the winter months. When 
he was quite young his parents removed to Jasper county, where he remained 
until he was nine years of age, when he returned to Lake county and lived 
with his grandfather until he started out upon an independent business 
career. He was first employed as a farm-hand by the month and continued 
thus to serve until twenty-one years of age. At that time he took up the 
study of telegraphy, and in 1885 entered the employ of the Pennsylvania 
Railroad Company, working as telegraph operator until 1888. In that year 
he came to East Chicago as assistant station agent, and in March, 1889. he 
was appointed agent at Hammond, Indiana. On the 27th of January, i8gi, 
he was appointed agent at East Chicago and served in that capacity until the 
29th of December, 1903, when he resigned in order to engage in business for 
himself. He then joined the Clapper 'Brothers in forming the present firm 
of Smith & Clapper Brothers, liverymen, of East Chicago. They have a 
well equipped barn and do a good business, which is constantly increasing. 
Mr. Smith is also agent for the East Chicago Company, a real estate firm 
which is developing one of the good sections of the city, and he also owns 
three valuable properties there, his home being located at 4414 Magoun 
avenue. In March, 1904, Mr. Smith was appointed agent for the United 
States Express Company at East Chicago. 

On the 2ist of May, 1893, Mr. Smith was united in marriage to Miss 
Maude Holmes, a daughter of ]\Iilton D. and Helen (Turner) Holmes. 
Four children have been born of this union: Leonard C. (deceased), Beulah, 
Irene and Rolland. Both Mr. and Mrs. Smith hold membership in the Con- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 271 

gregational church and take an active part in its work and contribute liber- 
ally to its support. He is now serving as a member of the board of church 
trustees. He is also deeply interested in the cause of education and is serving 
his second term as treasurer of the city scliool board. Politically he is a 
Republican, and is a progressive and public-spirited man and takes an active 
and helpful interest in every movement that he believes will contriliute to the 
general progress and improvement. 

CHARLES C. BOTHWELL. 

Charles C. Bijthwell, stock farmer, buyer and shipper, of Section 5, 
Ross township, has spent his life of successful effort in Lake county, and is 
numbered among the highly esteemed and prosperous citizens of the county. 
He lias given the best in him to his life work, which occoimts for the results 
he has gained, but he has also performed his share of public duties and 
responsibilities as a friend and neighbor and a citizen of the community. 

Mr. Bothwell was born in Ross township. Lake county, June 11, 1852, 
being a son of John A. and Nancy (Button) Bothwell, the former a native 
of Vermont and the latter of New York. His father came to Lake county in 
1839. thus being one of the earliest settlers, and located first in St. John's 
to\vnship, later in Ross township, and for about five years lived in Porter 
county, after which he returned to Lake county and lived here till his death, 
at the advanced and venerable age of eighty-three years. He followed farm- 
ing all his life. He and his wife are both buried in Ross township. They 
were the parents of eight children, of whom Charles was the third. 

]\Ir. C. C. Bothwell was reared in Ross township with the exception of 
the five years spent in Porter county, and he finished the education begun in 
the common schools at the Crown Point high school. As soon as his school 
days were ended he engaged in farming and the buying and shipping of 
cattle, which he has made the chief lines of his pursuit ever since. He has a 
farm of two hundred and eighty-three acres with excellent unprovements. 
and besides the large crops of hay and grain, he keeps and feeds a large 
number of cattle and hogs. He also carries on a considerable dairy business. 

Mr. Bothwell is one of the influential Republicans of his township. He 
is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church. He was married, October 
26, 1884, to Miss Anettie Stone, who was born in Elkhart. Lidiana. Sep- 



27-2 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

teml>er i6, 1857. They have had five children: Cora; WaUer; Charles 
Benjamin; Lillie May; and Lottie, who died in infancy. Airs. Bothwell 
was reared and educated in Elkhart, Indiana, and she was educated in the 
common schools and then a course in the Elkhart high school, after which 
she obtained her teacher's certificate, having attended the Valparaiso Normal 
and taken the teachers' course. She taught five terms in Lake and Porter 
counties. Her father was a native of Vermont and was reared as an 
agriculturist. He was well educated. He was a Republican in politics. 
He died at the age of seventy-five years in Elkhart. Mother .Stone was 
reared in Vermont and she died in Elkhart county, aged about forty years. 
There are four of the Stone family yet living: Benjamin Stone, a resident of 
Elkhart county: Amanda, widow of Richard Berritt, of Hartline, Wash- 
ington: Hubert .Stone, a resident of Elkhart: and Mrs. Bothwell. The 
children of Mr. and I\Irs. Bothwell have recei^-ed good educational training. 
Cora received her diploma in the class of 1903, and she was a student at the 
Valparaiso Normal School. She has taken music and also elocution. 
^Valter is in the fourth grade, Benjamin is in the eighth grade of the public 
schools. He is a gifted penman and he is taking up the art of photography. 
He also takes music. Lillie May is in the sixth grade, and has taken music. 

JACOB RIMBACH. 

Jacob Rimbach, a prominent retired citizen of Hammond residing at 
78 West Sibley street, has been a resident in the vicinity of Hammond for a 
longer period perhaps than any other present inhabitant of the city. In 
fact, when he first came here, a half century ago, no town was here, and the 
name and the town did not come into existence until nearly a quarter of a 
century later. He has lived a life of industry, good business management 
and foresight, and high and noble integrity, and is esteemed at the present 
not only because he is one of the largest property owners of the city, but 
also because of his own personal worth and character and for the part he has 
played in advancing the progress and welfare of his adopted city. What he 
has accumulated in the way of worldly wealth has been done so by diligence 
and sagacity in investment, and he deserves the credit of having achieved his 
own success and of being a self-made man. 

Mr. Rimbach was born in the province of Eisenach, Germany, December 




.^at&i (JIj(^}z£3u^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 273 

■3, 1832, being one of two sons and tlie only one now living born to Christopber 
and Elizabeth (Hassar) Rinibacb. His mother's father lived and died in 
Germany, and his histor_v is lost in conseqnence of his having died when his 
children were small. Christopber Rimbach's parents were Jacob and Chris- 
tina Rimbach, both of uhom died in Germany, and they bad one son and two 
daughters. Christopher Rinibacb was a shoemaker by trade, and died in 
Germany about 1835. ^^^ wife survived him till 1893, and was about 
seyenty-two years old at the time of her death. They were Lutherans. She 
w'as married a second time, her husband lieing b'rederick Schroeder, and 
their two daughters are now both deceased. 

Mr. Jacob Rimbach was reared in the land of his foref.ithers, receiving 
a common school education. He had a farm training, and knew the \'alue 
of honest endea\'or long before he came to this country. In 1834 he accom- 
panied bis mother to America and settled on the jjresent site of Hammond, 
before the town had been started. He and his brother Frederick began work 
on the Michigan Central Railroad, which road bad lieer: built through the 
county only three years before. Two years later he was made foreman of a 
section, and continued in the employ of that company for twenty-four years, 
filling the position of foreman for twenty-two. After leaving the service of 
the railroad he started the M. M. Towle lumber yard in Hammond, being 
its manager for two years. He owned ten acres of land within the present 
confines of Hammond, and when he Cjuit the lumber business he devoted his 
time to flower gardening. He divided bis land into town lots and gradually 
sold them off, and also built a number of cottages on them. He now owns, 
in addition to his good home at 78 West Sibley street, a block of business 
buildings, including the Lion Store building, and also about fifteen tenant 
cottages. He is now living retired in the main, l)eing occupied only by the 
oversight of his extensive property interests. 

In 1858 Mr. Rimbach married Miss Mary Hillman, and they have four 
daughters : Emma, who married Morris Cbami^aign, and has two daughters, 
May and Emma; Henrietta, who married Fred Champaign, and has two 
children. Myrtle and Fred : Francisca, who married Frank lianson. and has 
two children, Jacob and May; and Louise, who wedded Otto Marback, and 
has a daughter, Anna. Mrs. Rimbach's parents, August and Christina 
(Feidel) Hillman, were natives of Germany and came to America in Decem- 

18 



274 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

ber, 1854, settling at Xew Buffalo, Michigan. Her father followed various 
occupations. He died in Chicago in January, 1898, at the age of eighty-four 
years, followed in death a week later by his wife, at the age of eighty-one. 
They were both Lutherans in religion. They were the parents of four chil- 
dren : Mrs. Mary Rimbach ; Caroline, deceased, who was the wife of Andrew 
Burman; Sophia, the wife of Adolph Foin, of Los Angeles, California; and 
August, of Hammond. 

]\Ir. and Mrs. Rimbach are members of the Lutheran church. At the 
time of the Civil war he paid fourteen hundred dollars for a substitute in the 
army. He is a stanch Republican in politics, and is a member of the county 

council. 

HENRY SCHR.\GE. 

Honored and respected by all, there is no resident of Whiting who occu- 
pies a more enviable position in public regard than does Henry .Schrage. the 
president of the Whiting Bank and one of the early settlers of Lake county. 
His position of influence is not due alone to his success, but is the result of 
the honorable, straightforward business policy be has ever followed, his entire 
career being such as will bear the closest investigation and scrutiny. More- 
over, he is an active factor in public life and one whose influence has been 
exerted toward general progress, reform and improvement. 

Mr. Schrage is a native of Germany, his liirtli having occurred in 
Auhgen, Hessen, on the 21st of January. 1844. The first ten years of his 
life were spent in the fatherland, and he then came to America with his 
parents. Chris and Fredericka Schrage, who on crossing the Atlantic took 
lip their abode in Chicago, whence they removed to Lake county in October. 
185J. The subject of this review was reared where the to^vn of \\'hiting 
now stands. He attended the public schools of Chicago and remained at 
home until aliotit twenty years of age, when in response to the call of his 
adopted country he enlisted in 1863 as a member of Company K. Thirteenth 
Illinois Volunteer Infantry, as a private. He thus served until the close of 
the war and diil active duty with his regiment, which was assigned to the 
Seventeenth .\rmy Corps under the command of General Sherman. When 
hostilities had ceased and his aid was no longer needed to defend the Union, 
the preservation of which was an established fact, he received an honorable 
discharge, in July, 1865. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 275 

Mr. Sclirage then returned to \\'liiting and entered the railroad service 
as a section hand, being thus employed until 1868. The following year he 
engaged in business on his own account, opening a small general store, which 
he continued to conduct with fair success until about 1890. He then retired 
from active business and enjoyed a brief period of rest, but in 1895 he 
opened the Whiting Bank, a private banking institution. He also owns the 
East Chicago Bank, which he purchased in 1902. and he is tlierefore well 
known in financial circles in Lake county. These institutions have become 
recognized as strong financial concerns, and he is now conducting a large 
and prosperous banking business. He is at the same time a representative of 
that class of American citizens who, while promoting individual success, 
also advance the general welfare and prosperity. As his financial resources 
have increased he has made judicious investments in real estate, and he now 
owns much property in Whiting, in East Chicago, Hammond, South Chicago 
and in the city of Chicago. He has been identified in large measure with 
the upbuilding of Lake county, few men having contributed in greater degree 
to the substantial progress and upbuilding of his section of the state, in which 
he has spent the greater part of his life. 

Mr. Schrage was united in marriage to Miss Caroline W'ustenfelt. who 
was born in the province of Hessen, Germany. This marriage was cele- 
brated in 1868, and has been blessed with six children: Harry C. who is 
cashier of the Whiting Bank; Mary, the wife of August Tresen : William C. 
who is cashier of the East Chicago Bank; Herman; Sophia C. at home; and 
Walter E.. who is employed in the bank in Whiting. The family is well 
known in that city and its members are prominent in local circles there. In 
the front rank of the columns which have advanced civilization and improve- 
ment in this portion of Lake county stands Mr. Schrage, and has been among 
those who have led the way to the substantial development and progress of 
Whiting, being particularly active in the growth of the city, in which he 
still makes his home. His memory goes back to the time when this was an 
undeveloped region. Init when the town was founded he had the business 
foresight to recognize possibilities here and to utilize them for the benefit of 
the public as well as his individual interests. As a business man he has been 
conspicuous among his associates not only for his success, but for his probity, 
fairness and honorable methods. In everything he has been eminently prac- 



27(i HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tical. and this has been manifested not only in his business undertakings, but 
also in social and private life. 

JOHN E. LUTHER. 

John E. Luther, who has been a resident of Lake county since seven 
years of age and has a wide acquaintance within its borders, the ^ice-presi- 
dent of the First National Bank of Crown Point, is a veteran of the Civil war 
and a citizen whose active co-operation in public affairs has led to substantial 
improvement in northwestern Lidiana. He is a native son of this state, his 
birth having occurred in Porter county three miles from Valparaiso on the 
22d of November, 1840. His paternal grandfather was James Luther. 

His father, James H. Luther, was born in Chazy, New York, in 1814. 
and when eighteen years of age went to the west. A j^ear later he became a 
resident of Porter county, Lidiana, where he followed farming until 1849. 
In that year he arrived in Lake county, locating at Crown Point, and he 
carried on agricultural pursuits on a tract of land that embraces the site of 
the two railroad depots and the public-school building of this city. He was 
honored with public olifice, being chosen county auditor for two terms or 
eight years. He carried on merchandising from 1855 until 1859 as a mem- 
ber of the firm of Luther, Holton & Company, and the firm then became 
Luther & Farley, while subsequently John G. Hoftman succeeded the firm of 
Luther & Farley. Prominent and influential, his efforts in behalf of his com- 
munity were effective, and he was recognized as one of the leading men of 
Lake county. His aid in behalf of general progress was never sought in vain, 
but was given with a cheerfulness that made his work of much value in public 
affairs. He was a Whig until the dissolution of the party, when he became 
a stanch Republican and continued to march under the banners of that party 
until his demise. During the period of the Civil war all of the nioiiev that 
came to the county from the government was given to him for distribution 
among the families of the soldiers. He was reared in the Presbyterian doc- 
trine, but for many years was a spiritualist. He died at the advanced age of 
seventy-nine years and five days. His wife, who bore the maiden name of 
Phoebe Ann Flint, was a natixe of X'ermcint and lived to be about twenty- 
seven years of age. They were the parents of four sons, all of whom reached 
manhood, namelv : John E., AniiiS O., Albert W. and Henrv E. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 277 

Jolm E. Lutlier, the eldest son, is now tlie only living representative of 
the family. He was but eight years of age when he came to Lake county, 
and here he attended the district schools, his first teacher being Martin ^^'ood. 
When about nine years of age he went to Valparaiso, where he worked for 
fi\'e vears in the printing office with his uncle. Judge \\". C. Talcott. On the 
expiration of that period he came to Crown Point, and later he went to Min- 
nesota with a drove of cattle, walking all the wa}'. He was ele\'en weeks on 
the road, receiving ten dollars for the trip. Mr. Luther remained in Minne- 
sota for about two years, driving a stage for a year and a half and during 
the remainder of the time working in a livery stable. On the expiration of 
that period he returned to Crown Point and accepted a clerkship in a store 
owned by John G. Hofifman. When a little more than a year had passed he 
offered his services to the governm.ent, enlisting April 19, 1861, under Alark 
L. Demotte, being the first man to enlist from Crown Point. He became a 
mem1>er of Company B, Twentieth Luliana Volunteer Lifantry, and after 
serving for two years as a private he was commissioned first lieutenant and 
adjutant, continuing in that rank until October 10, 1864, when he was mus- 
tered out as a supernumerary officer. He took part in twentv-seven inqiortant 
engagements and was three times wounded, but he has never appliet' for a 
pension. He was mustered out because of the consolidation of tb.e Seventh, 
Fourteenth and Nineteenth regiments with the Twentieth Lidiana Regiment, 
and as all of the officers could not be retained in their rank Mr. Luther was 
among those who was retired, for he had already served for three years and 
a half. He is life president of his regimental association. 

Li November, 1864, Air. Luther returned to Crown Point, and on the 
28th of December following he was united in marriage to ]\Iiss Addie \\'ells, 
a daughter of Henry Wells. She was torn in Crown Point, was educated in 
the public schools there and was well known in the city. Her death occurred 
August 25, 1875. at Indianapolis, and she left one son, Harry W., who died 
in San Francisco of blood poisoning, July 15, 1896. 

In 1868 Mr. Luther entered the employ of the McCormick Reaper Com- 
pany and went to Galesburg, Illinois, where he remained through that season. 
He afterward continued with the company as bookkeeper and travelirig sales- 
man until 1879, when he removed from Indianapolis to Troy, Ohio, where 
he was engaged as bookkeeper for the firm of Beadle & Kelly. He spent 



278 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

several years in Ohio, and in 1S82 went to California, where he remained 
for one year, and since 1886 he has resided continuously in Crown Point. 
He has been vice-president of the First National Bank since 1900 and is one 
of the oldest stockholders of that institution. He also owns a farm of about 
three hundred and twenty-five acres and has valuable city property. He is 
now living retired from active business, giving supervision merely to his 
invested interests. 

Mr. Luther is a member of John Wheeler Post No. 161, G. A. R., of 
which he is a past commander. He is also a member of the Lfnion Veteran 
Legion, Encampment No. 84, of Indianapolis. He did his duty to his coun- 
try willingly and with marked loyalty because of his love for the L'nion, and 
he does not ask to be reimbursed for the sacrifice \\hicli he made in behalf of 
the stars and stripes. In politics he has been a life-long Republican. He 
certainly deserves great credit for what he has accomplished, as he started 
out in life in early boyhood without capital. As a business man he has teen 
conspicuous among his associates not only for his success but for his probity, 
fairness and honorable methods. In everything he has been eminently prac- 
tical, has discharged every public duty with ability and fairness. 

WILLIAM F. BRIDGE. 

^^'iIliam F. Bridge, city engineer of Hammond and county surveyor of 
Lake county, has lived in Hammond since 1890 and is a proficient member of 
the civil engineering profession and is popular in both business and social 
circles. 

Mr. Bridge was born at Delphi. Indiana, April 11. 1864, being the only 
son and child of Jacob C. and Emma (Witberow) Bridge, both natives of 
Indiana. His paternal grandfather, John Bridge, was a native of Ohio, was 
a farmer there, and afterwards came to Carroll county, Indiana, at an early 
(lay, where he Ixiught land of the government and improved it and added to 
his property until he had a large estate of five hundred acres. He was of 
Scotch descent. He died in Carroll county when about seventy years old. 
His wife, Rosanna Carr by maiden name, died at about the same age, and 
they had two children. Mr. Bridge's maternal grandfather, James Witberow. 
married a Miss Filson, and they were early settlers of Carroll county. He 
was an elder in the Presbyterian church, and died in middle age, having had 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 279 

four cliildren. Jacob C. Bridge was a bookkeeper for many years. He lived 
in Deipbi. Incbana, until i8S6. was tben in Colorado for four years, and 
since tben be and bis wife bave been residents in Hammond. His wife 
is a member of the Presbyterian cburcb. 

Mr. William F. Bridge was reared at Deipbi, Indiana, graduating from 
the high school there in 1884, and later took a special course in Wabash 
College. He tben took up the study of civil engineering, and has followed 
that profession ever since, having gained a most creditable position in its 
ranks. He spent the years from 1886 to 1890 in Colorado, and since then 
has been a resident of Hammond. He was elected city engineer of Ham- 
mond in 1893, and, with the exception of four years, has been in that office 
since. He was elected county surveyor of Lake county in 1902, and assumed 
the duties of that office in January, 1903. He has given entire satisfaction 
in both offices. In the spring of 1904 Mr. Bridge was nominated for a 
second time as surveyor of Lake county. 

Mr. Bridge is a member of the Presbyterian church, and bis wife is a 
Baptist. He affiliates with Garfield Lodge No. 569, F. & A. M., with Ham- 
mond Chapter, R. A. M., and with Hammond Commandery, K. T., and is 
also a member of the Knights of Pythias and the Benevolent and Protective 
Order of Elks. He belongs to the Sigma Chi college fraternity. In politics 
he is a Republican, and is city chairman of the Republican committee. 

December 23, 1885, Mr. Bridge married Miss Lillian Sharrer, a daugh- 
ter of Dr. Wilbur and Catharine (Moore) Sharrer. Four children were 
born of this union, Edgar, Grace, Norman and Helen. Mrs. Lillian Bridge 
died in January, 1900. She was a member of the Presbyterian cburcb. On 
August 19, 1903, ^Ir. Bridge married Miss Bertha C. Watkins, a daughter 
of Rev. W. G. and Ruth (Evans) Watkins, the former a native of Wales 
and the latter of Pennsylvania. 

Mrs. Bridge's paternal grandfather, William Watkins, was a native of 
Wales, whence be came to the LTnited States and settled in Pennsylvania. 
He was a Baptist minister, and died in middle life. His wife was named 
Mary. The maternal grandparents of Mrs. Bridge were Robert and Susan 
(Todd) Evans: the former was a son of Da\-id Evans and was a native of 
Wales, and died when a young man : the latter lived to an advanced age, and 
was the mother of four children. 'Mrs. Bridge's father was a Baptist minis- 



280 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

ter, a graduate of Bucknell University, of whicli she is also a grafliiate, and 
he now Hves in Scranton, Pennsylvania, in which state he has done most 
of his ministerial work. He has always heen in public life, and for a num- 
ber of years taught music. He and his wife were the parents of six children, 
one son and five daughters: Bertha C. (Mrs. Bridge). Susie. Lillian. Ethel. 

Earl and Ruth. 

HENRY CHESTER. 

Henry Chester, of section 17, Ross township, is one of the well known 
old settlers and prominent agriculturists of Lake county, having spent over a 
half century in his one township. He spent his youthful days among the 
rather crude and primitive conditions of that time, and has ever since been 
identified with the progress and advancement that have raised Lake county 
from an unprofitable wilderness to one of the banner sections of the state. 
He recalls many of the interesting experiences of that earh' day. His oppor- 
tunities for literarv' accomplishment were meager, and as he had to work 
during the daylight hours he did his reading by the light of a rag dipped in 
a saucer of grease or by the flickering firelight of the old-fashioned hearth 
and chimney. And when he clad himself in his best and went forth to attend 
one of the balls of the countryside, he and his best girl rode in a wagon drawn 
by an ox team. From this primitive conveyance to the modern automobile 
graphically represents the progress of Lake county and the world in general 
since Air. Chester was a carefree boy on his father's Lake county farm. 

Mr. Chester was born in Columbia county, Pennsylvania, Octoloer 15, 
1834. His grandfather. John Chester, was a native of England, whence he 
came at an early day to Pennsylvania, and for seven years fought in the ranks 
of the patriots in the Revolutionary war. becoming an officer in the Con- 
tinental army.- He saw and talked with Genera! Washington and was a 
prominent man. His son Charles, father of Henry, was born in Pennsyl- 
A'ania, and came out to Lake county, Lidiana, as a pioneer in 1847. living 
here until his death in 1874. He married Mary E. Price, a native of Penn- 
sylvania and of German descent, and they were the parents of two daug"hters 
and one son that reached maturity. 

Mr. Henry Chester was aly)Ut twelve years old when he came to Lake 
county with his parents, and his subsequent rearing and early traim'ng was 
in Ross township, where, indeed, he has spent the rest of his life. When the 




H 



'JyTlA^ 



CyhJ^^aAl\ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 281 

war came on he enlisted on September lo, 1861. in Company G, Ninth IHi- 
nois Cavalry, and served until his honorable discharge, Octoljer 31, 1865. 
after giving four years and three months of his youth and strength to the 
defense of the Union cause. From choice he remained a private through all 
this time. He was in many battles in Kentucky, Tennessee. Mississippi, and 
the various campaigns of the middle west. He returned home to engage in 
the farming pursuits which have ever since employed him so profitably. He 
operates over a thousand acres of as fine land as lies in Lake county, and his 
agricultural enterprises mark him as one of the most progressive and success- 
ful farmers of his vicinity. He has also taken part in local affairs, and is 
well known throughout the county as a representati\e and public-spirited 
citizen. 

Mr. Chester was first married, in 1859, to Miss Harriet Perry, who was 
born in I^orter county, Indiana, a daugliter of Ezekiel Perry. They had one 
child, ]\Iary, wife of Henry Merchant. Mr. Chester's second wife was Har- 
riet L. Hanks, of New York state, and at her death she left five children: 
Ella, wife of Charles Olson; Lovisa, wife of Charles Nelson; Carrie, wife of 
William Raschka, a merchant of Ainsworth, Lidiana; and Charles E. and 
James H. Mr. Chester married for his present wife Mary E. Baird. and they 
have three children: Jerome, John and Daisy. The children ha\'e received 
good and practical educations, and Miss Daisy has taken instruction in music. 
Mrs. Chester was born in Westmoreland county, P'ennsylvania, November 
8, 1854, being the eldest of the ten children, four sons and six daughters, 
born to Samuel and Jane (Oakes) Baird. When she was a girl of twelve 
years her parents moved west to Bureau county, Illinois, where she com- 
pleted the education begun in her native state. 

!\Tr. Chester is a member of Earl Lodge No. ^t,^, I. O. O. F., at Hol,art, 
and his wife belongs to the Rebekahs at the same place. Mr. and Mrs. 
Chester are both church members, their respective denomin;itions bemg the 
Methodist Episcopal and the Baptist. 

From this brief review of the main facts of his career, is indicated the 
prominent position that Mr. Chester IkiIcIs in his community and in Lake 
county. His individual enterprise and success and his strength of character 
are marked in still bolder outlines when it is remembered how he has hcen 
the architect of his own fortunes, and is a trulv self-made man. At tlie 



232 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

beginning of his active career lie worked for wages, receiving only thirteen 
dollars a month. Yet with this seemingly scant hold on prosperity's coign 
of vantage he continued to climb higher to success, and during his useful 
career has accumulated a large estate and made his life a factor for good 
throughout Lake county. 

ANDREW KAMMER. 

Andrew Kammer, postmaster at St. John, has been a well known man 
of affairs in this town for a number of years. He has held his present office 
almost continuously for seventeen years, which in itself shows his popularity 
with the community and his prestige as a public-spirited and energetic 
citizen. The first few years of his life were passed in his native land of 
Germany, but he was practically reared and has been identified with Amer- 
ican institutions all his life. He has followed various lines of business, and 
during his connection with Lake county affairs has accjuired property interests 
in several places. He is an influential citizen, and a hearty worker in any 
cause that he takes up and believes to be for the general welfare of the 
community. 

\lr. Kammer was born in Hesse-Darnstadt, Germany, September 2, 
1838. and at the age of eight years accompanied his parents to America, 
landing at Baltimore. He remained in that city until i860, gaining his 
education and learning the tailor's trade. He followed that business in 
Cumberland. IMaryland, until 1868, and then returned to Baltimore, where 
he continued in business for a year. In 1869 he came out to Lake county, 
Indiana, locating at St. John, and for the first six years taught school during 
the winter seasons. For ten years he was traveling in the interests of the 
Catholic V olkszeihmg, Baltimore, Maryland, and did much business for that 
paper. He was also on the road eight years as the representative of a liquor 
house. In December, 1887, ^^^ ^^'^s appointed to the office of postmaster of 
St. John, and with the exception of eight months has held the office con- 
tinuously to tlie present time. Some years ago he built three tenant houses 
in \\'hiting, being one of the first to make that kind of investment in that 
town, and he still owns this property and rents it. 

May 3, i860, Mr. Kammer married Miss Katherine Wagner, who was 
born in Germanv and came as a girl to America, having lived in this country 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 283 

since she was fourteen years old. ]\Ir. and Mrs. Kammer have seven children 
living: Elizabeth; Mary; Nicholas; Michael; Theodore A., a teacher in 
the public schools of St. John ; Andixw ; and Catherine. The family are 
members of the St. John Catholic church. 

ADAM J. GERLACH. 

Adam J. Gerlach. with residence and farm on section 30, Center town- 
ship, has been identified with the most important interests of Lake county 
for over forty years. He passed part of his boyhood in this county, after 
which he was one of the popular and leading workers along educational lines 
for many years, and the latter part of his career has been devoted most suc- 
cessfully to the life insurance business and to farming, so that his years have 
been both varied in their activity and prosperous in their fruits. 

Mr. Gerlach was born at Harper's Ferry, Virginia, March 8, 1848, 
being a son of Michael and Catherine (Wirtheim) Gerlach, both natives of 
Bavaria, Germany. His father, on coming to America, located at Harper's 
Ferry, and in 1857 brought his family to Lake county, Lidiana, settling in 
St. John township. He improved his first farm and also was the owner of 
two other farms, being during his lifetime one of the leading citizens. He 
taught school for some time and for many years was assessor of his township. 
He died at the age of seventy-five, and his wife in her seventy-sixth year. 
They were the parents of seven children, four sons and three daughters, and 
all but one are living and married at the present time. 

Mr. Adam J. Gerlach, who is the third child and third son, was about 
nine years old when he came to Lake county, where he continued the educa- 
tion he had l>egun in Virginia. He graduated from the Crown Point high 
school, and from that time has made his own way in the world. He began 
by clerking in a store, but at the age of seventeen entered upon his career 
as school teacher, which he continued, altogether, for twenty-one years. One 
term was in Cook county, Illinois, but all the rest was in Lake county. He 
taught different branches, English and German being favorites, and he also 
made a specialty of musical instruction, both vocal and instrumental. He 
is an accomplished musician, and at the present time is organist in St. Mary's 
Catholic church at Crown Point. 

He now resides on his farm of two hundred and fortv-fi\-e acres situated 



284 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

three and a half miles south of Crown Point, where he owns one of the fine 
farmsteads of this part of the county. But he devotes most of his time to 
soliciting life insurance for the Aetna Life of Hartford, having been agent 
in this business for twenty-one years. He has written many thousands of 
dollars in this time, and his work has extended to all parts of the county. 
One of his chief industries on the farm is a large dairy, and in this connec- 
tion he has become one of the directors of the Chicago Milk Shippers' Union, 
which comprises man}- thousand dairies of Lidiana. Illinois and Wisconsin. 
He is also interested in a company organizing, at Crown Point, a jelly manu- 
facturing business. About eighteen farmers of the surrounding country will 
raise currents for this enterprise. 

]\Ir. Gerlach is one of the well known Democrats of Lake county, and 
for some years served as justice of the peace. He is a member and a trustee 
of the Catholic church at Crown Point. He was married, August lo, 1S74, 
to Miss Margaret Scherer, the daughter of Nicholas and Frances Scherer, 
who were among the early settlers of Lake county, where Mrs. Gerlach was 
born. Mr. and Mrs. Gerlach ha\"e had thirteen children, and all are living 
but one, who died in 1903, the others being as follows : Adam ]M. : Amelia, 
wife of Theodore Stech ; George F. : Frances : Agnes ; Michael : Joseph ; 
Richard; Philip; Susan; Josephine; and Lillie. Adam and Agnes graduated 
in the Crown Point public schools, and the former and George F. are mem- 
bers of the Crown Point brass band. Mr. Gerlach, being so proficient in 
music, has given his children fine instruction in music, and at gatherings, 
assemblies and farm institutes they take a prominent part. 

JUDGE GEORGE \^^ JONES. 

Active in community affairs which have had important bearing upon 
public progress and improvement. Judge G. W. Jones is numbered among the 
leading and representative men of ^^'hiting, Indiana, where he is now filling 
the oiifice of justice of the peace. He has also been closely associated with 
educational affairs there and has done much for the upbuilding of the schools. 
In an official connection he has Ijeen largely instrumental in securing the 
attendance at school of a greater percent of pupils than had hitherto been 
enrolled. His labors have always been of a practical character, attended by 
results that are far-reaching and beneficial. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 285 

Judge Jones is a native of Ohio, liis l^n-th having occurred in Butler 
county on the Jjd of May. 1844. He is a son of Dr. Caleb H. and Beulah 
(Staggs) Jones, the former of Welsh descent and the latter of English 
lineage. His paternal grandfather, Jonas Jones, was a native of New Jersey, 
and was a civil engineer by profession. Removing westward he surveyed 
a large part of southern Ohio and was one of the promoters of pioneer devel- 
opment in that portion of Ohio. His son. Dr. Caleb H. Jones, was also a 
native of Butler county, Ohio, prepared for the practice (if medicine in early 
life and continued active in the prosecution of his profession up to the time 
of his death, which occurred in 1848. His wife was a native of North Caro- 
lina. On her father's side she was of English lineage and on the maternal 
line her ancestry could be traced back to John Smith, whose life was saved 
by the Indian maiden Pocahontas. 

Judge Jones was the seventh in a family of nine children born to Dr. 
and Mrs. Jones. He spent his youth in the county of his nati\'ity, and his 
early boyhood was a period of earnest and unremitting toil, for when he was 
only four years of age he was left an orphan. He earned his living during 
the greater part of the time until he had attained the age of sixteen years, 
but the elemental strength of his character was thereby developed and he be- 
came a self-reliant, courageous young man who bravely faced life's duties 
and made the most of his opportunities. In 1861 he offered his services to 
the government as a defender of the Union, enlisting in Company D, Fifth 
Regiment of Ohio Cavalry. He served for three years and seven months in 
the army as a private, but was promoted to the rank of sergeant. He took 
part in the battles of Shiloh, the siege of Corinth and the liattle at that city, 
the siege of \'icksburg and the engagement at Lookout JNIountain, where was 
displayed on.e of the most daring military feats of the great war. He was 
also with Sherman on the celebrated march to the sea. 

When the war was over and he was mustered out of service. Judge 
Jones returned to his native county in Ohio and there served a lerm of 
apprenticeship as a machinist. In 1867 he made a business trip to Europe, 
being gone about si.x weeks, during which time he \isited Li\'erpoi:)l and 
other points in England, beside going to France. After his return to his 
native land he remo\-ed to ^liddletown. Ohio, where he remained until 1869, 
and in the fall of that vear he came to Indiana, locating at Kentland. He 



286 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

afterward removed to Sheldon, Illinois, \\here he engaged in the manufacture 
of carriages and wagons for a short time. He next went to California, 
afterward to Australia and subsequently to Japan and China, looking for a 
location and a better country than America. He remained in Australia for 
three months and visited Hongkong, China, and Yokohama, Japan. His 
travels, however, convinced him that there was no better country on the 
face of the globe than his own United States, and upon once more reaching 
this country he located in Sheldon, Illinois, where he remained for two years. 
During that time he was married and later he went to Nebraska, settling at 
Lone Tree. There he secured a homestead claim and continued its cultiva- 
tion and development until the grasshoppers entirely destroyed his crops. He 
next returned to Iroquois, Illinois, and afterward went to Sheldon, while in 
January, 1SS4, he located in Hammond, Indian.a, where he entered the emplo)- 
of the Tuthill Spring Company and the Chicago Carriage Company, being 
thus engaged until he entered the services of the Hammond Packing Com- 
pany as a machinist, filling that position until 1890, when he came to Whiting. 
Here Judge Jones entered the employ of the Standard Oil Company as a 
machinist and foreman of the compound press house, and later was sent to 
the round house in the switching department. During the last four years of 
his connection with the Standard Oil Company he had charge of the repairs 
on locomotives, and was regarded as one of the most capable and trusted 
representatives of the corporation in \\'hiting. 

In the meantime J\Ir. Jones had become recognized as a prominent and 
influential factor in pubHc life, e.xerting strong influence in Iiehalf of measures 
for the general good. In 1898 he was elected justice of the peace of Whiting 
and has served in that capacity continuously since, discharging' his duties 
in a prompt and able manner, his decisions l>eing strictly fair and impartial. 
He was also elected city clerk of Whiting and is now filling that office. He is 
likewise engaged in the insurance business, ha\-ing lime to devote to these 
interests as well as his official duties. He is now vice-president of the board 
of children's guardians of Lake county, In(liana, and since taking his place 
as a member of the board he has made strenuous and effective eft'orts to keep 
children out of the saloons, and more children are now attending school than 
ever before in Whiting. He is the only Democrat that has been elected to 
public office in the town, and this fact is indicative of the confidence and trust 



** HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 287 

reposed in him by his fehow citizens. He is not bitterly aggressive in politics, 
for while he believes in Democratic principles he casts his ballot inclepen- 
dently at local elections where no issue is in\-olved. Since 1867 Judge Jones 
has been an exemplary member of the Masonic fraternity and has nITed all 
the chairs in the local lodge. He is also a Knight of Pythias, holds mem- 
bership relations with the Knights of the Maccabees and Colonel Robert 
Heath Post, G. A. R., of Hammond, in which he has tilled all of the posi- 
tions with the exception of that of quartemiaster. 

In 1870, while living in Sheldon, Illinois, Judge Jones was united in 
marriage to Miss Margaret Markley, and to them were born two sons and 
one daughter: Harry, wdio is an engineer for the Standard Oil Company; 
Guy, a switchman in the employ of the same company : and Ann.ie, at home. 
The Judge and his family are well known in A\'hiting. wdiere they occupy an 
enviable position in social circles and have many warm friends. He has taken 
a very active and helpful part in public affairs, and in his life record has dis- 
played many commendable characteristics. His benevolent spirit has 
prompted generous assistance to the borough, and he has the reputation of 
giving more liberally than any other man in \Miiting according to his means. 
No one in need seeking his aid is turned away from his door empty-handed, 
and while he does not believe in the indiscriminate giving that fosters \a- 
grancy and idleness, he does everything in his power to help those who are 
willing to help themselves. Judg'e Jones attended school for only aI;out ten 
months, and his knowledge has all been acquired through practical experience 
and by reading and study at night. He has made the most of his oppor- 
tunities as the years have advanced, and to-day he is a well-informed man, 
widely and favorably known throughout the community, his abilities well 
fitting him for leadership in political, business and social life. The terms 
progress and patriotism may be considered the keynotes of his character, for 
throughout his career he has labored for the improvement of every line of 
business or public interest with which he has been associated and at all times 
has been actuated by a fidelity to his country and her welfare. • 



288 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

JUDGE W. C. McMAHAN. 

Judge W. C. McMahan. in igo2 elected to liis present office of circuit 
judge, has been one of tlie leading members of the bar at Crown Point for the 
past twenty years, and liis legal talent and learning, his wholesome and 
genial personality, and his loyalty to the public welfare have been recognized 
in an extensive law practice and a large personal and party following who 
have honored him with various public offices, the last being the circuit judge- 
ship. Since taking his seat on the l^ench he has fully preserved the judicial 
dignity of the office and has made a most commendable record by his ex- 
peditious yet thorough handling of the numerous cases on his docket. His 
career has been typical of those of many successful law^yers, he having entered 
upon the law after a period of experience in school teaching and having 
passed the usual novitiate of hard study and early trials in gaining recogni- 
tion from the people. His past record proves his success, and he has reached 
his present prominence at the bar and bench while in the prime of manhood, 
being a man of forty-six and with many years of useful work before him. 

Judge McMahan was born in Carroll county. Indiana, August 2, 1858, 
being of Scotch-Irish lineage. His grandfather, Rolaert Mc]\Iahan, was an 
Indian trader, and served as aide-de-camp to General Washington. He was 
later one of the first settlers in the old town of Chillicothe, Ohio, \\here he 
located during the Indian wars. During the pioneer epoch of Ohio history 
and throughout the remainder of his life he was actively identified \,ith the 
development and upbuilding of that state and of Indiana. 

Judge McMahan's father is Robert ^McMahan, who was born in Darke 
county, Ohio, and when a small boy went with bis parents to Tippecanoe 
county, Indiana, where he was reared to the occupation of farming, passing 
his youth among frontier scenes. He Ijecame a farmer of Carroll county, 
where he has devoted his energies to agricultural i)ursuits to the present 
time, although he is now seventy-nine years old and one of the honored 
patriarchs of his community. By his first wife he had one son. He was 
afterward married in Carroll county to Miss Martha White, who was born 
in Ohio and is still living. Her father, Zenas White, was a native of Ohio, 
and settled in Carnll county, Indiana, in 1832. Of this second union six 
children were born, four sons and two daughters. 



^^»p? 




HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 289 

Judge McMalian. the eldest of liis lirotliers and sisters, was reared in 
Carroll county. Indiana, dlitaining his early education in the country and 
village schools. He later attended the normal school at Ladoga. Indiana, 
and for four years engaged in teaching school. With his amhition set for 
the profession of law. he entered the L^nix-ersity of Michigan at Ann Arbor, 
and studied there one year. He spent amither year in reading law with a 
firm in Logansport. and in 18(83 ^^''^s admitted to the liar at Delphi Carroll 
county, Indiana. In A]M-il of the following year he located in Crown Point 
and began the practice which he has continued with so much success during 
the last twenty years. He has almost continuously been in some office de- 
manding his professional services. He was town attorney for sixteen years, 
was prosecuting attorney of the county from 1890 to 1894. and in lanuary, 
1902. was appointed to the position of circuit judge and in the fall of the 
same year was elected to that office. He has for a number of years been one 
of the influential Republicans of this part of the state, and as far as his duties 
permit he takes an active part in politics. His only fraternal affiliations are 
with the Knights of Pythias. 

In 1888 Jude McMahan married Miss Irene Allman. a daughter of 

Amos and Mary (Luther) Allman. She was born in Crown Point, and by 

her marriage became the mother of three children : Claudia, Mary and 

Maurine. 

SETH L. PEARCE. 

Seth L. Pearce, of section 19, Eagle Creek township, is a life-long resi- 
dent of this fertile portion of Lake county, and has been prominently identi- 
fied with its farming and stock-raising interests during nearly all his years 
since attaining manhood. Very little time has been spent away from the 
scene of his childhood joys, and his career has been worked out to a suc- 
cessful degree of fulness among the people and in the environments that 
he has known since he first became conscious of the great world about him 
As the head of a happy home and as a factor in the social and business life 
of his community he has borne his share of responsibilities and become 
known everywhere in his township as a man of integrity and industrious 
habits. 

Mr. Pearce was born in Eagle Creek township. Lake county, July 29, 
1854, being the eighth child and the third son of Michael and Margaret J., 



290 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

(Dinwiddie) Pearce. His father, who was one of the pioneer settlers of 
Lake connty, was horn in 1808 and died in 1861, and his mother was torn 
in 1818 and died Augnst 8, 1894. Besides Seth L., there are six children 
living : John, in whose biography on another page further details of family 
history will be found; Harriet, wife of Isaac Bryant, of Hebron, Indiana; 
Nancy Ann. wife of O. V. Servis, also written of in this volume; Alary J.. 
-wife of W. T. Buchanan, of Eagle Creek township; Susanna, wife of G. H. 
Stahl. of Eagle Creek township; and Thomas, on the old homestead. 

Mr. Seth L. Pearce was reared in his native township, and after attend- 
ing the local schools went to the Crown Point high school and then to 
the Northern Indiana Normal School at Valparaiso. He spent a year and 
a half in Oregon and California, but returned to his native township to 
take up the agricultural pursuits which have ever since formed his chief 
occupation and given him his liveliho(.Kl. After his marriage he located 
on the farm where he still resides, consisting of one hundred and sixteen 
acres, well improved and under his cajiable management producing good 
general crops and stock. Mr. Pearce is a stanch Republican, and in church 
matters is a member of the United Presbyterian church at Hebron, taking a 
useful part in its work. 

March 16, 1886, Mr. Pearce married Miss Sarah G. Patterson, a native 
of Kosciusko county. Indiana, wliere she was born July 16, 1859, the daugh- 
ter of John and Alargaret ( Kirkpatrick ) Patterson. Her father was born 
in Pennsylvania. September 15, 1799, and died April 7, 1864, and her mother 
in Ohio. August 21. 1819. and died December 12, 1900. She is the only 
■child of their marriage. She was reared and educated in her native county. 
Father Patterson was reared as an agriculturist in Pennsylvania, and edu- 
cated in the log-cabin school of "ye olden days." In his early life he was 
a Whig, and at the birth of the Republican party took up its principles. He 
came to Ohio from Pennsylvania and afterwards to Kosciusko county. In- 
diana, in 1843. ^"<^'- tliere had purchased one hundred and twenty acres of 
land in Plain township. He and wife were memtors of the United Pres- 
byterian church. Mother Patterson was born in Clarke county. Ohio, and 
was seventeen when she became a resident of Indiana. Mrs. Pearce was 
educated in the common schools, was also a student in the Warsaw high 
school three years. She is a lady of genial, cordial bearing, and her cosy. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 291 

hospitable home is a ha\-en for friend or stranger. Mr. and Mrs. Pearce 
have one daughter, Margaret E., born March 6. 1887, and who graduated 
from the Crown Point high school in 1904. She expects to enter a universitN 
of high rank, and take the classical course. 

JAMES MONTGOMERY HALSTED. 

James Montgomery Halsted, of section 11, Ross township, is a life- 
long resident of Lake count}-, and has found in agricultural pursuits the 
best employment for his energies and a means of gaining a comfortable 
hvehhood and a substantial place in the world of material circumstances. 
He is a son of one of the very earliest pioneers to the county, so that the 
Halsted family has figured in the industrial and social life of Lake county 
from its earliest years to the present, and, furthermore, have always retained 
the esteem and high regard of their fellow citizens and business associates. 

Mr. Halsted was born in Ross township, September 12, 1852. His 
father. James Halsted, was a native of Oneida county, New York, and about 
1838 came out to Lake county, Indiana, locating in a very sparsely settled 
community and playing the part of the doughty pioneer in clearing the 
ground and making way for civilization. He was a farmer all his life, and 
lived to the advanced age of eightv-seven years. He was a member of an.d 
helped to build the Unitarian church at Hobart. In politics he was a Demo- 
crat from the time of casting his first vote to the last. His wife was Mary 
Woodhouse, who was born and reared in New York city, a daughter of 
Edwin Woodhouse. She is still living at the age of seventy-six, and has 
been the mother of six children, four sons and two daughters, all of whom 
grew up and married, and five are living at the present writing. 

Mr. James M. Halsted is the eldest son and the second child. He was 
reared in Ross township, being educated in the puljlic schools, and he 
remained at home and assisted his parents until his marriage, in 1877. In 
the same year he located on the farm where he has since made his home. 
This consists of one hundred and fifty-seven acres of well improved and 
highly cultivated land, and is devoted, under his skillful management, to 
general farming and stock-raising. Mr. Halsted is also interested in public 
afifairs, and ni 1904 was the Democratic candidate for the office of trustee of 
Ross township. 



292 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

He married, in 1877, Miss Emma Brown, the daughter of James and 
Jane Brown. She was Ixirn in Michigan City, LaPorte county, Indiana, 
.ind was reared there. Mr. and Mrs. Halsted have five children: Albert, 
Ura, Roy, Mamie and Ethel. 

CAPTAIN C. A. FRIEDRICH. 

Captain Charles A. Friedrich is the proprietor of the Harbor riotel at 
Indiana Harbor and is one of the upbuilders of the town, which has had an 
existence of but a very few years, but in this brief space of time has made 
rapid strides, enjoying a marvelous yet substantial growth. The hostelry 
of which Captain Friedrich is projirietor is the leading one of the town, and 
in addition to its conduct be is also engaged in real estate operations. 

The Captain is descended from a distinguished family of Germany, 
prominent in public life there. His grandfather Friedrich was commander 
of and had supervision over all the fortifications in central Gemiany, and at 
his death was buried under the monument which he had erected at Coburg, 
Germany. He married a Miss Demuth, and among their children was 
Charles E. Friedrich, the father of Captain Friedrich. He, too, was a native 
of Germany, and was in the government service throughout his entire life. 
He lived for a time in Saerbricken. He became a prominent officer, and the 
emperor voluntarily placed a medal upon his breast — the medal of the order 
of the Red Eagle. He was twice married, his first union being with Miss 
Leopoltina Miller, also a native of Germany and whose father spent his entire 
life in that country, where he conducted a hotel. To Mr. and Mrs. C. E, 
Friedrich were born three children, who are still living : Charles A. ; Emelia, 
the wife of Ernst Gross, of Rheinholz, Germany: and Julius, of New York, 
.\fter the death of his first wife the father married Katharina Dawald. and 
thej^ had four sons — Ernst, Robert, Rudolph and Carl, all in Germany. 
Charles E. Friedrich died in the year 1899. ^^ the advanced age of seventy- 
nine years, while the mother of (lur subject died of cholera in 1866, Both 
were consistent members of the Lutheran church. 

Captain Charles A. Friedrich was reared in the fatherland and acquired 
his education in that country. When he had completed the high school 
course he attended college and afterward entered a sailors' school at Ham- 
burg. Germany, known as the German Seamen's School, v.here he pursued a 




if^^^ ^^ ^^^.^^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 293 

tliorough course. Subsequenth- he entered tlie merchant marine service, 
wliicli claimed liis time and energies until 1901. His first trip to America 
was made in 1865. he landing at Xew York in April on the dav that Presi- 
dent Lincoln was assassinated. He continued to follow the ocean until 1869, 
when he began sailing on the Great Lakes, and was captain of \arious ves- 
sels until 1 90 1, when he determined to abandon the vocation which had so 
long occupied his attention, and came to Lidiana Harbor. 

Captain Friedrich was the first nian who slept in his own bed in the 
town. He opened the Harbor Hotel, renting the building when it was Init 
partially finished, and the first night he had sixty-six boarders. There was 
not a bedstead in the house at the time, although he had four thousand dollars' 
worth of furniture upon the way, it being almost impossible to get the furni- 
'ure from the cars by wagon, because of the swampy and stumpy condition 
of the ground, almost making hauling impossible. As rapidly as possible. 
howe\-er, he providetl for the comfort of his guests, and the Harbor Hotel 
has ever maintained the first place among the leading hostelries of the town. 
He has a good patronage and his success is assured because of the enter- 
prising" methods he follows, and his earnest and untiring efforts to please 
his patrons. He is also interested in the real estate business and has handled 
considerable property here. 

The condition of Indiana Harbor at the time of the opening of the hotel, 
contrasted with its present condition, indicates the rapid growth of the town, 
which now contains a population of three thousand and is still rapidly grow- 
ing. The wise system of industrial economics which has been brought to 
bear in the development of Indiana Harbor has challenged luiiform admira- 
tion, for while there has been steady advancement in material lines there 
has been an entire absence of that inflation of \-alues and that erratic "boom- 
ing" which ha\'e in the past proved the eventual death knell to many of tlie 
localities in the central west, where "mushroom towns" ha\e one day smiled 
forth with "all modern improvements" and practical!}- on the next ha\'c been 
shorn of their glories and of their possibilities of stable prosperity until the 
existing order of things shall ha\'e radically changed. In Indiana Harbor 
progress has been made continuously and in'safe lines, and in the healthful 
growth and advancement of the town Mr. Friedrich has taken an acti\e part. 

On the 14th of May, 1898. Captain b'riedrich was united in marriage 



294 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

to Miss Xellie T. Burke, a daughter of Jt>lin and Tlieressa Burke. He belongs 
to several fraternal organizations, including the Odd Fellows, the Knights of 
Pythias and the Improved Order of Red Men, and lia^ attained the uniformed 
rank in the K. of P. He is a member of the Indiana HarlKir. Columbia and 
Jackson Park Yacht clubs. Politically he is a Republican, but his attention 
has never been directed tOAvard oiTice-holding. as he prefers to perform his 
duties of citizenship in other ways. While on the water he had some thrilling 
experiences, and now he is living the more cjuiet life of a hotel proprietor, 
ably ministering to the wants of the traveling public and by his genial, oblig- 
ing manner making many friends. 

SEYMORE PATTON. 

Seymore Patton is one of the oldest citizens of Lake county, both in 
years of his age and in length of residence, and his honorable and active 
career as a fanner here for over forty-five years is one of the important 
items of the histon,' of Center township. He came here in the strength and 
vigor of his young manhood and settled on the land which has ever since 
formed part of his homestead, and from the wild prairie and woodland he 
developed a farm whose continued cultivation has afforded him a most honor- 
able occupation and a means of livelihood, resulting in comfortable circum- 
stances for his old age and in grateful esteem and regard from all his fellow 
citizens and associates. 

Mr. Patton was born in Trumbull county. Ohio. December i8, 1828, 
a son of John and Eliza Jane (Dixon) Patton. the former a native of Butler 
county, Pennsylvania, and the latter of Ireland, whence she came to America 
at the age of fourteen. His parents were married in Butler county, Penn- 
syhania, where his father followed the occupation of farming, but spent his 
last years in Lake county, Indiana, where his death occurred at the age of 
sixty-four years. His mother died in this county at the age of sixty. There 
were sixteen children in the family, and all but one grew up and married 
and reared families. 

Mr. Patton, the fifth child of the family, was reared in Trumbull countv, 
Ohio, and was educated in that county's public schools. He was married 
there in 1852, and in the same year he came to Indiana, for the first two vears 
being located in the south part of the state, in ^Morgan county. In 185^ he 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 295 

came to Lake county, but two years later moved to LaPorte county, whence 
two years later he moved back to Lake county. He then bought the farm 
where he now lives, and has continued his home and habitation thereon 
during ail the subsequent \ears. He found the place a raw prairie, but he 
has placed and replaced many improvements since the day of his arrival. 
The present home place consists of eighty acres besides fifteen acres of tim- 
ber tract. 

In 1852 Mr. Patton married Miss Sarah Ann Beber, who was born 
near Allentown, Pennsylvania, and died May 8, 1904. Five children were 
bom of this union of over fifty years, and four are now living: Anna M., 
the wife of Freelaird Price, of Norton county, Kansas; Sarah, unmarried; 
William H., at home and performing most of the active work of the farm; 
and Vina, at home. Anna was a successful teacher in Lake county and also 
in Kansas. Mr. Patton has long been one of the Democratic voters of the 
county, and has always given his influence to the work of progress and devel- 
opment of his community. 

JAMES PATTON. 

James Patton, retired farmer of Winfield township, is a representative 
citizen of Lake county, entirely deserving of the substantial place he has 
gained in the esteem and high regard of his fellow citizens. His life of 
more than threescore and ten years has been fruitful in many ways. From 
early years he devoted himself industriously to his duties as a farmer, and 
only within the last few years has he remitted the diligence and constant 
effort which gained him prosperity in material circumstances and influence 
in affairs of citizenship. He made his first acquaintance with Lake county 
over fifty-five years ago, and some fifteen years later returned to this fertile 
agricultural section of northern Indiana and made it the field of his 
endeavors for his subsequent active career. He is accordingly well informed 
as to the various epochs in Lake county's industrial and political history, 
and is one of the honored old-timers. 

Mr. Patton was born in Trumbull county, Ohio, April 26, 1831, being a 
son of John and Eliza Jane (Dixon) Patton, the former a native of Butler 
county, Pennsylvania, anti the latter of Ireland, whence she came to America 
at the age of fourteen. His parents were married in Butler county, Penn- 
sylvania, where his father followed the occupation of farming, but spent 



296 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

his last years in Lake county, Indiana, where his death occurred at the age 
of sixty-five. There were sixteen children in the family, and all but one 
grew up and married and reared families. 

Mr. James Patton, the eighth of this large family, was reared in Trum- 
bull county, and during his boyhood attended a log-cabin school for several 
years, drinking in such knowledge as this primitive fountain of learning 
afforded. In 1848, when aged seventeen, he started out in life for himself, 
coming to Lake county, Indiana, where he remained and gained a good 
acquaintance with the country for three years. He returned to Trumbull 
county, where he was married, and remained in his native county until 1864, 
when he went to Williams county, Ohio, and in 1868 came and took up his 
residence in Winfield township of Lake county, where he continued his suc- 
cessful larming operations until 1901, when he moved to his present resi- 
dence in the same township and resigned most of his former business cares. 
Mr. Patton has always adhered to the Democracy in his political views. 
He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church. He married, in 1858, 
Miss Mary Earl, who was born and reared in Trumbull county, Ohio, and 
died in Lake county, April 9, 1894. There were eleven children born of 
this marriage, but six are deceased. Those living are : Euthema, the wife 
of David Booth, of Chicago; Kittie, wife of William Vansciver, of Crown 
Point; Orwillie, wife of Michael Hefron, of Chicago Heights, Illinois: Flora 
Unora, at home; and James, unmarried. 

AMOS ALLMAN. 

Amos Allman is numbered among the honored dead of Lake county, 
whose memory is yet enshrined in the hearts of many of those who enjoyed 
his friendship. His life was so straightforward, his conduct so manly and 
his actions so sincere and unaffected that he won the warm regard of all with 
whom he was associated and he left behind him an untarnished name, 

Mr. Allman was born at Alwick, in Yorkshire, England, Fel^ruarv 17, 
1825. His parents were Major and Margaret ( Haxby) Allman, who were 
also natives of England, and there the mother spent her entire life. She 
passed away in 1826, leaving six children, of whom Amos was the youngest. 
Four years later, in 1830, the father bade adieu to friends and native country 
and ■with his children sailed for the new world, at first settling in Canada. In 
1843 lis became a resident of Crown Point. 




/^:^^^f-;T ^4^5 



;^^--e^ ^ii^^/- 1^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 297 

Amos Allman accom])anie(l his father on the emigration to the new- 
world wlien but five years of age and hved in Toronto and \\'hitby, Canada, 
residing with liis eldest sister. In 1842 when about seventeen years of age 
he entered upon an apprenticeshi]) to the tailor's trade in Stnrgis, Michigan, 
and the following year he removed to Crown Point, where he worked at his 
trade, but was soon obliged to abandon this vocation because of the partial 
failure of his eyesight. Several years later he returned to Sturgis, Michigan, 
and there embarked in merchandising, continuing in business at that place 
until 1855. In the latter year he once more came to Lake county to look 
after his father's business and with the exception of one year spent in Niles, 
Michigan, he remained continuously a resident of Crown Point from 1855 
until his death. His father had served as county recorder up to the time of 
his death in 1856 and in that year Amos Allman was elected to the position, 
which he filled for eight consecutive j'ears, having been re-elected. He was 
also for eighteen months, beginning' in 1856, deputy revenue collector at this 
pert. After his retirement from office Mr. Allman turned his attention to 
the abstract and real estate business, in which he continued for a long period, 
becoming widely known in that way. He handled much valuable property, 
negotiated many important real estate transfers and did a large abstract busi- 
ness, so that his clientage in both departments brought to him a good financial 
return and as he carefully husbanded his resources he was eventually enabled 
to retire frcjm active busiriess life and spend his remaining days in the enjoy- 
ment of a well-earned rest. He erected a number of buildings in Crown 
Point, including his own beautiful home, and tlius he contributed in sub- 
stantial measure to the improvement of the city. 

Mr. Allman was twice married. On the 26th of November, 1857, he 
was joined in wedlock to Miss Olive Wilcox, who died on the ist of June, 
1859. On the 22(1 of March, i860, he was again married, his second union 
being \\ ith ]\Iiss Mary A. Luther, and they became the parents of five chil- 
dren, who survi\e the father, whose death occurred at his home in Crown 
Point January 14, 1897, when he was nearly seventy-three years of age. 
Mr. Allman held membership with no church, but lived a most uprig'ht, hon- 
orable life, was always temperate in his habits and generous in his support 
of religious and benevolent enterprises. Indeed his career was in manv 
respects most exemplary. He was always deeply interested in the growth and 



298 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

progress of the city and his co-operation could always he counted upon to aid 
in the advancement of any movement which promised to be of lasting benefit 
to Crown Point. He possessed a strong love of nature and was never happier 
than when he could find time to get away from his office and spend some 
hours nearer to nature. He was a man whom to know was to respect and 
honor. Numbred among Crown Point's pioneers his entire life to his fellow 
townsmen was as an open book which all might read. He possessed strongly 
domestic tastes and while he accomplishetl much in the business world and 
ratified his friendships by kindly sympathy and thoughtful consideration for 
others, his greatest depth of love was reserved for his family. 

MRS. MARY ALLMAN. 

Mrs. Mary Allman. the widow of Amos Allman, of Crown Point, whose 
sketch is given above, was born in Concord, New Hampshire, October i8, 
1832, and is a daughter of James and Irena (Ransom) Luther. Her father 
was also a native of the old Granite state and in the year 1834 he emigrated 
westward to Indiana, becoming one of the pioneer settlers of the state. He 
took up his abode in Porter county and there secured a tract of wild and unim- 
proved land, which he transformed into a good farm, carrying on agricult- 
ural pursuits on that property up to the time of his death, which occurred 
when he was in his sixty-second year. His wife survived him, for some time 
and passed away in her sixty-ninth year. This worthy couple were the parents 
of ten children, seven sons and three daughters, all of whom reached years 
of maturity, but Henry, Maria, John, Amos, Caleb, Charles and ]\Iartha A. 
are all now deceased. Those still living are Martin, who makes his home in 
Colorado, and Mary A. 

Mary Luther was but two years old when brought by her parents to 
Indiana. She was reared in Porter county and after attending the common 
schools of those early days she became a student in Valparaiso. When about 
sixteen years of age she began teaching and was thus engaged until twenty 
years of age. On the 22d of March, i860, she ga\e her hand in marriage to 
Amos Allman, whose life record is given above. By her marriage she be- 
came the mother of two sons and three daughters: \\'alter L.. who is repre- 
sented elsewhere in this volume; IMary I., the wife of Judge McMahan, 
whose life historv is also given in this work; Claude W'.. who is with his 




^piPoAAA a, aUr. 




HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 299 

brother Walter in business: Jessie May. at homie: and Xellie L.. the wife of 

J. B. Neal. of Joliet. Ilhnois. All were born in Crown Point. Mrs. Allman 

has spent almost her entire life in Indiana and has long been a resident of 

Crown Point. She is one of the pioneer women of this portion of the state 

and has witnessed the wonderful transformation that has occurred as Lake 

and Porter counties have emerged from frontier conditions into a high state 

of civilization. She has a wide accpiaintance in northwestern Indiana and 

to-day many friends entertain for her the warmest regard. Mrs. Allman is 

a lover of flowers and among the beauties of nature she enjoys many happy 

hours. 

CARL EDWARD BAUER. 

Carl Edward Bauer, secretary of the Simplex Railway Appliance Com- 
pany at Hammond, is one of the practical and progressive business men of 
the city. As a mechanical expert and contriver he is especially proficient, 
and as such has been a valuable mernber of his company. He has been an 
American citizen for over twenty years, and owing to his ability he has 
been constantly engaged in useful activity and has filled a worthy niche in 
the world of industry. Pie is one of the highly esteemed citizens of Ham- 
mond, where he has lived for the past six years, and in both business and 
social and civic affairs his personal integrity and worth of character have 
made him a man of influence. 

Mr. Bauer was born in the village of Langenholzhausen, province of 
Lippe-Detmold, Germany, on November 5, 1857, being a son of Ferdinand 
E. and Minna (Bock) Bauer, both natives of the fatherland. His mother 
was a daughter of Christian Bock, who was a farmer and brewer and also 
ran a bakery at Varenholz, in the province of Lippe-Detmold. He had an inn 
in that place, and was a prominent burger of the town, serving as its mayor. 
He died at the age of fifty-five years, and his wife surAived him a number 
of years. They had three children. 

The paternal grandfather of Mr. Bauer was Frederick E. Bauer, who 
was a German miller, and was also mayor of his home ^■illage. He lived 
to be about seventy years of age. His wife, who attained the age of seventv- 
six, was named W^ilhelmina Alello, whose father was a Hollander and later 
a German settler. 

Ferdinand E. Bauer was one of a good-sized familv. Pie followed in 



300 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

the footsteps of his father and made niilHng his occupation until veiy 
recently. He is now living retired at the advanced age of eighty-seven 
years, being one of those sturdy Teutons who never grow old and -who retain 
their vitality to the last. He resides in his old home at Langenliolzhausen. 
He is still able to read without glasses. He has been a prominent man in 
his community, having been mayor of the village a number of times, and 
also a deputy to the provincial diet. In his younger days he traveled all 
over Europe, and is a well-informed and most intelligent old gentleman. 
His wife is also living, and well and liearty at the age of eighty-three. They 
belong to the Reformed church. They were the parents of four sons and 
two daughters: Leopold; August; Johanna, wife of Rev. Koriif; Emil; 
Carl E. ; and Helen, who died at the age of six years. 

Mr. Carl E. Bauer was reared and educated in Germany, and served 
his full time in the cavalry branch of the regular army, being a non-com- 
missioned officer during his service, and at the time of his departure from 
the country he was a lieutenant of the army reserve. His education was 
received in the gymnasium and his technical training at the polytechnic 
school, so that he had the thorough and careful German equipment for life's 
duties. 

He came to America in 18S2, locating first at Terre Haute. Indiana, 
where he was in the employ of the Terre Haute Car ^Manufacturing Com- 
pany as a mechanical engineer. He was there until 1887, and then took a 
similar position at Muskegon. Michigan, with the Muskegon Car Company, 
with whom he remained until 1892. From that time until 1895 he was in 
the employ of the Indiana Car and Foundry Company at Indianapolis, and 
for the following two years was with the Illinois Car and Equipment Com- 
pany. In 1897 he began his connection with the Simplex Railway Appliance 
Company, which in the following year located its shops at Hammond. He 
is now secretary of the company. From three to four hundred persons are 
employed by this concern, and their large annual product consists of various 
kinds of car and railway appliances. 

Mr. Bauer has fraternal affiliations with Hegewisch Lodge Xo. 766, 
I. O. O. F., and also with Crystal Lodge No. 258, K. of P. His politics 
are Republican. He has a nice home on Hohman street, and he and his 
family .stand high in the social circles of the city. He was married in April, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 301 

1887, to Miss Olga Wittenberg, a daughter of Otto and Charlotte (Sachs) 
Wittenberg. There were four sons and two daughters born of their union : 
Walter; Gretchen; Carl; Minnie, who died at the age of six years; Ernest, 
who lived only a little over a year; and Emil. 

NATHAN B. MEEKER. 

Nathan B. Meeker, who has been a well-known and prosperous farmer 
of Center township on the old Meeker homestead for over a quarter of a 
century, is a member of an influential and long established family of Lake 
county, his brothers, J. Frank and Charles H., being worthy and successful 
representatives of the professional and business life of the county as he him- 
self is of the agricultural interests. He has devoted his best efforts and 
endeavors tO' farming since arriving at years of manhood, and these thirty 
odd years have l^een prosperous from a material and individual standpoint 
and of eminent usefulness to the social and industrial development and 
progress of the community in general. 

Mr. Meeker was born in Wyoming county, Pennsylvania, November 4, 
1850, being the eldest son of Sherman B. and Elizabeth (Gress) Meeker, 
whose history is furtlier detailed in the sketches of their above mentioned 
sons, to be found on other pages of this work. 

Mr. Meeker, when four years old, was brought from his native place to 
Illinois, about a year later to Calhoun county. Michigan, at the age of nine 
to White county, Indiana, and thence to Carroll county, and in 1865 to Lake 
county, where his home has been ever since. He was educated in the public 
schools of the last three mentioned counties, and was reared to farm life 
and remained at home assisting his parents until his marriage in 1873. 

Mr. Meeker married, April 29, 1873, Miss Isadore Craft, and they 
have one son, Thomas C, who is studying in the pharmacy department of 
the Northern Indiana Normal at Valparaiso. Mrs. Meeker was born in 
Ohio, .\pril 23, 185 1, and came with her parents, Thomas and Lucinda 
(Forsha) Craft, to Lake county when she was about two years old, and she 
was reared and educated at Orchard Grove, Cedar Creek township. There 
were twelve children in the Craft family, seven sons and five daughters, and 
there are seven now living: Morgan, who is married and is engaged in the 
furniture and undertaking business in Monon, White countv, this state; 



302 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Cassander. who is married and is a farmer at Momence, Kankakee county, 
Illinois; Mrs. Meeker; James, a farmer of Lake county; Jennie, who was a 
Lake coimty teacher and is now the wife of George Norton, a farmer of 
Lake county ; Adelbert, who is married and is farming at Lowell ; and Elza, 
a farmer in this county. 

Mr. and Mrs. Meeker began their married life as renters in Kankakee 
county. Illinois. They located in Center township in 1878, on the homestead 
farm of one hundred and sixt)' acres, where they have resided ever since 
and conducted a farming and stock-raising business. They are citizens of 
high standing socially and personally, and are held in high esteem throughout 
their home township. 

Mr. Meeker has been a life-long Republican and first voted for General 
Grant. He and his wife are members of the Grange, and he has fraternal 
affiliations with the Knights of the Maccabees at Crown Point. 

]\Irs. Meeker's parents are both deceased, and the following paragraphs, 
taken from the local press, give the details of their useful and well-spent lives 
and add to the completeness of this biography : 

"Thomas Craft, the subject of this week's half-tone illustration, is now 
a resident of Lowell, where he moved a short time ago to spend his remain- 
ing years. 

"He was born in Pennsylvania on July 24. 1826. At the age of five 
years he moved with his parents to Ohio, in which state he received his early 
education in a day when school facilities were not of the best and school 
hours few and far between. On arriving at manhood he first started to 
work for his father at one hundred dollars per year, but at the end of the 
first year found tliat this was earning money too slow, so he cleared about 
four acres of timber land and started into the cultivation of tobacco and 
made considerable money ni raising and handling this product. 

"He was married November 30, 1848, to Lucinda Forsha, with whom 
he lived happily for forty 5'ears, when death claimed her in 1888. In 1854 
he moved with his family to Orchard Grove, where he first purchased one 
hundred and fifty acres of land, to which he added other purchases from time 
to time until at last his total holdings were over four hundred acres of well 
improved real estate. 

"He has eight children, all of whom with the exception of one are 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 303 

married and living upon farms, with the exception of the oldest son, Morgan, 
who is in business at Monon, Indiana. 

"He was married again in 1894. 

"He has recently sold his entire farm to James Black, of Momence, 
for sixty dollars per acre, the tract bringing him twenty-four thousand dol- 
lars, and a public sale of his personal property netted him two thousand 
dollars, thus leaving him sufficient means to provide for his welfare in his 
old age and enable him to live in peace and comfort." 

"Passed Away — Mrs. Lucinda (Forsha) Craft was born in Marietta, 
Monroe county, Ohio. January 16, 1830. Died at her residence in Orchard 
Grove, Indiana, January 31, 1888, aged fifty-eight years and sixteen days. 
She was married to Thomas Craft, November 30, 1848, in Fredericktown, 
Ohio. In the fall of 1854 she with her husband moved to Lake county, In- 
diana, where she lived till her death, then crossing the bright river. She 
was the mother of twelve children, three in their heavenly home, nine on earth. 
She lived happily forty years with her husband. January 25 she was taken 
very ill, and after six days of intense suffering, she gave up life on earth for 
a brighter home above. She has passed away and left us with nothing but a 
pleasant memory. A break has been made in our hearts by that casket, open 
grave and silent mound, which can never lae healed. 

"Dearest mother, thou hast left us. 
And gone to that better land ; 
Would that you could have remained with us 
But the voice of God you heard. 

"Oh ! mother, thou hast left us. 
To jom that heavenly band. 
Nevermore to return to your lo\'ed ones — 
Lefl us here, on this desolate plain." 

HEIXRICH C. SCHRAGE. 

Heinrich C. Schrage is filling the position of teller in the Bank of 
Whiting and is a son of Henry Schrage, the president of the institution, 
wild is mentioned on another page of this work. Heinrich C. Schrage was 
born (in the 2d of July, 1869, pursued his education in the public schools 



304 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

here and in the Lutheran school at Coleliour, IHinois, where lie spent one 
year. He entered upon his business career as a clerk in the general store 
owned by his father at Whiting, and served in that capacity until he took 
charge of the postoffice in 1892. He remained there until 1896, since which 
time he has been largely connected with banking interests. He was. how- 
ever, appointed postmaster in January, 1899. and filled that position for two 
and a half years, when he resigned in order to accept the position of teller 
in the Whiting Bank. In this capacity he is now serving, and he has thor- 
ough and practical knowledge of the banking business that has resulted 
in making him one of the strong and influential representatives of financial 
interests in Lake county. The bank has a capital and a surplus of sixty 
thousand dollars and a large business is conducted. The management of 
the institution devolves in marked measure upon INIr. Schrage, who is well 
qualified for the onerous duties. 

Mr, Schrage has spent most of his life in W'hiting and is well known 
here. He is the owner of considerable real estate in Schrage avenue, having 
houses there which be rents, and these bring to him a good income. In politics 
be is a stanch Republican, and he belongs to the Lutheran church. In \Mnt- 
ing he is well known, and bis social qualities have made bim popular with 
a large circle of friends, and the fact that many of his stancbest friends are 
those who have known bim from early boyhood is an indication that his 
salient characteristics are those which command respect, confidence and 

good will. 

CHARLES A. JOHNSON. 

Charles A. Johnson, nominee for c(iunty auditor and who is engaged in 
the undertaking business in Whiting and is also agent for the Adams Express 
Company, was born in Chicago, Illinois, June 5, 1866, his parents being 
Andrew M. and Margaret Johnson, both of whom were natives of Sweden 
and who on emigrating to the new world established their home in Chicago. 
On the 18th of July, 1866, Andrew M. Johnson removed with his family 
from that citv to Lake count)-. Indiana, his son Charles being then nnh- but 
six weeks old. The bo}' was reared in this county, pursued his early education 
in the public schools and afterward attended Augustana College at Rock 
Island, Illinois, where he completed his school work. He then returned to 
his father's farm and for some four or fi\e years remained with his parents. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 305 

Being the youngest of the family he assumed cliarge of the home farm after 
the others had left and continued its management up to the time of liis mar- 
riage. He had early been trained to habits of industry and economy upon the 
old homestead place, and was familiar with the work of field and meadow 
when he relieved his father of the care and lalior of the farm. 

In 1888 Charles A. Johnson was united in marriage to Miss Matilda 
Wild, who died April 19, 1894. She was the mother of four children, of 
whom two are now living: Charles E. and Herbert T. On the 3d of March, 
1899, Mr. Johnson was again married, his second union being with Mrs. 
Charlotte Beck, and they are now well knuwn in Whiting, where they have 
an extensive circle of friends. 

Mr. Johnson took up his abode in this city on the 5th of March, 1892, 
and embarked in the undertaking business. He also established a livery 
stable and has continued in both lines to the present time. He holds three 
diplomas for efficiency in embalming, having attended and graduated from 
the United States School of Embalming at St. Louis, conducted by Professor 
Sullivan; the Boston School of Embalming, under Professor Dodge, and 
the Embalming School of Professor Myers at Springfield, Ohio. He has a 
well equipped undertaking establishment, carrying everything in his line, 
and he is also receiving a liberal patronage in the livery business. He is like- 
wise agent for the Adams Express Company and is thus well known in the 
business circles of Whiting. 

Mr. Johnson is quite active and influential in local political circles and 
has been chosen for a number of public offices. He served as trustee of his 
town for two years, has been president of the town board, and, March 19, 
1904, received the nomination for county auditor of Lake county on the Re- 
publican ticket. For many years Mr. Johnson has taken a leading" part in 
Republican politics of Lake county, and ever since he gamed his majority he 
has earnestly supported the principles and policies of that party and without 
question has fully earned the nomination for the office of county auditor. 
Socially he is connected with the Knights of Pythias fraternity, the Benevolent 
and Protective Order of Elks and with the Knights of the Maccabees. 
Almost his entire life has been passed in Lake county, and the circle of his 
acquaintances has continually grown. By perse\-erance. determination and 
honoraljle eft'ort he has overthrown the obstacles which barred his path to 
20 



306 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

success, and through untiring activity has reached the goal of prosperity. He 
is recognized in his comanunity as a man of broad mind and pubHc spirit. 
and his genuine worth has won liim high esteem. 

MARCUS M. TOWLE. 

Marcus M. Towle, the well-known business man of Hammond, has the 
distinction of being one of the founders of this now thriving city in extreme 
northwest Indiana. Hammond is best known to the outside world for its 
dressed beef industries, and it is a matter of history that Mr. Towle took part 
in the establishment of the first packing house in this place, as it was one 
of the first in the country, and was one of the energetic and enterprising, 
members of the firm that sent some of the first consignments of beef abroad. 
He was not only thus active in giving birth tO' the city, but has since been 
vitally interested in the material development and progress of the city. 
While he has been successful in his own affairs, he has never neglected the 
welfare of his city, and with unselfish devotion to its good has participated 
in many enterprises, both in the capacity of an ofticial and as a private citizen, 
and for that reason is regarded by his fellow citizens as one of the most 
public-spirited and progressive of men. 

Mr. Towle was born in Danville, New Hampshire, January 14, 1843, 
a son of Amos G. and Mary P. (Page) Towle. His grandfather, Nehemiah 
Towle, was a native New Hampshire farmer, and died when aljout eighty 
jears old. His wife survived him some years, and they had only one son, 
Amos G. The latter was also a native of New Hampshire, and was a mer- 
chant, first in Danville and then in Haverhill, Massachusetts, where he re- 
mained up to the time of his death, in i860, when forty-four years old. He 
was postmaster at Danville under President Taylor, having been one of the 
eight men of the town who voted for Taylor. He and his wife were both 
Universalists. His wife, Mary (Page) Towle, who sur\-ived him until 
1900, being seventy-six years of age, was a native of New Hampshire and 
a daughter of Thomas Page, who was a New Hampshire farmer, a soldier 
in the war of 18 12, was the recipient of several offices in his township and 
the owner of considerable property, and lived to be a very old man, having 
been the lather of several sons and daughters. Amos and Marv Towle were 
ihe parents of sixteen children, seven sons and nine daughters, nine of whom 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 307 

are living now: Marcus RI.; Mrs. Mary Flanders, of Haverhill, Massachu- 
setts; Charles, of Haverhill; Porter, of Hammond, Indiana; Amos, of Ham- 
mond; Olive, of Haverhill: Mrs. Henrietta Ladd, of Haverhill; Elizabeth; 
and Clara. 

Mr. Marcus M. Towle lived in Dan\-ille until the age of twelve, and 
then moved with the family to Haverhill, in which two towns he received 
most of his education. He learned the butclier"s trade, and followed it for 
many years. He was in Boston for some time, and then came to Detroit, 
Alichigan, where he lived for six years, and then returned to Boston. In 
1869 he came out to where the present city of Hammond is situated, for 
there was no town there at the time. In partnership with George H. Ham- 
mond, Caleb Ives and George W. Plumer, he established the dressed beef 
business, which was the real foundation of the town. He also laid out the 
town and named it in honor of Mr. Hammond. The beef business was 
started as the Hammond, Plumer & Company, and at the death of Mr. 
Plumer in 1874 the business was incorporated as the George H. Hammond 
& Company, with Mr. Hammond as president and Mr. Towle as vice-presi- 
dent. Mr. Towle continued his connection with the company until 1884. 
They originated the dressed beef business in this country, and shipped the first 
cargo of dressed beef to England, Mr. Towle .going on the first trip and 
making arrangements in England for the handling of the product. The 
enterprise was started on a small scale, but eventually employed two thousand 
men. The firm has recently been removed to Chicago. 

On withdrawing from the meat business Mr. Towle engaged in various 
enterprises in the city. He organized the First National Bank in 1886. In 
1902-3 he built the fine new opera house known as the Towle Opera House, 
with a seating capacity of fourteen hundred persons. For the past ten years 
he has given his attention to the greenhouse and florist business, having 
now an area of twenty-five thousand square feet under glass, and carrying on 
an extensive trade in this and surrounding cities. 

December 25, 1865, Mr. Towle married Miss Irena Dow, a daughter 
of Jacob and Mrs. (Stevens) Dow. They have six children: Marcus M., 
jr., wdio is a clerk in the First National Bank, and who married Miss 
Matilda Gherke; George Hammond, who is assistant manager of the opera 
house; Fred Cheney, who is a locomotive engineer on the Erie Railroad; 



308 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Annie i\Iay; Birdie; and Ida Mary. Mrs. Towle is a member of tlie Meth- 
odist church. Mr. Towle affiliates with Garfield Lodge No. 569, F. & A. M., 
and was the first master of the lodge; also with Hammond Chapter, R. A. M., 
and Hammond Commandery, K. T. In politics Mr. Towle is a Republican, 
l)ut has been interested in party affairs only so far as it would help his city. 
He was the first mayor of Hammond, serving for two terms, and was town- 
ship trustee two terms, and has also been a delegate to several state con- 
ventions. He owns a beautiful residence, which he erected in 1885, and also 
has other city property. 

HON. NICHOLS SCHERER. 

Hon. Nichols Scherer has for many years figured prominently in pul^Iic 
afi'airs and business circles in northwestern Indiana, and his history is a 
notable one in that he came to this state empty-handed and in humble capacity 
entered business life. If those who claim that fortune favors certain indi- 
viduals will but examine into the life record of such men as Mr. Scherer 
they will learn that it is not circumstance or environment, but indefatigable 
energy and industry that form the basis of all success. Mr. Scherer, recog- 
nizing that each day held its duty and its opportunity, worked on steadily, 
performing to the best of his ability each task that came to him, and now 
after many years of residence in Indiana he is numlaered among the sub- 
stantial citizens and leaders in Lake county. He makes his home at Scherer- 
ville, which was named in his honor, and of which town he is the founder 
and promoter. 

Mr. Scherer was born in Prussia, Germany, on the 29th of June, 1830, 
and came to America with his parents. John and ]\Iary Scherer, in 1846. 
They landed at New York city, where they remained for about four weeks, 
and thence proceeded westward by steamer and canal boat to Chicago, and 
on to St. John township. Lake county, settling in the town of St. John. 
The father died about 1865, aged one hundred and three years and the mother 
died about 1870, aged ninety-nine years. The father died in Dyer and the 
mother died in Schererville, and both parents are interred in St. John's cem- 
etery in one grave. 

Mr. Scherer began working for the state of Indiana as swamp-land 
ditcher and was afterward appointed land commissioner, which position he 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 309 

held until he became ccnnected with raih'oad interests. He went from St. 
John to Dyer in the capacity of landlord, and in the latter place was engaged 
in the hotel business, as well as railroading. He remained there for aljout 
nine years, or' the expiration of which period he was engaged on the con- 
struction of the Panhandle Railroad, then called the Chicago & Great East- 
ern. He was head boss on the road from Richmond, Indiana, to Chicago, 
having charge of the building and the repairing and also running all kinds of 
trains. He located at what is now Schererville in 1865, being at that time 
connected with the Great Eastern Railroad, and he remained with the com- 
pany for twelve years. 

In the meantime he purchased the land upon which Scherer\'ille now 
stands, laid out the town, and it was named in his honor. He has been a 
resident here for almost forty years. He was with the Pan Handle Railroad, 
which is now a part of the Pennsyh'ania Railroad system, and during that 
time he als(T built a part of the Michigan Central Raih-oad at Union City, 
Michigan, and a part of the Eastern Illinois Railroad, of the Waliash Rail- 
rod, and the ]\Iil\vaukee «S: St. Paul Railroad, also constructing what is knov.-n 
as the Joliet cutoff, now a part of the Michigan Central Railroad. .\t the 
same time he was engaged in the sand business, shipping sand from Scherer- 
ville, and in this he still continues. He likewise dealt in real estate, and car- 
ried on farming, and thus extending his energies to many lines of Iiusiness 
acti\-ity he conducted important interests, which pro\-ed to him lucrative and 
made him one of the substantial citizens of northwestern Indiana. 

Mr.* Scherer has been a resident of Lake county for fifty-eight vears. 
and is \\ell known in this part of the state, his labors being of a character that 
ha\'e contriljuted to the dex'elopment and improvement of the state, as well as 
to his individual prosperity. Outside of the strict path of business he has 
also jiroved a helpful factor in interests for the general good, and has co- 
operated in many movements which have for their object the welfare of the 
general public. His political allegiance has always been given to the Democ- 
racy, and he has served as road superintendent and as constable. He was 
also swampland commissioner and for one term represented his district in 
the state legislature, where he gave loyal support to all bills which he be- 
lieved contained measures for benefit to the comnmnwealth. 

\\'hile residing in St. John Mr. Scherer was united in marriage to Miss 



310 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Francisco Ulilenl3rock, wlio was Ixirn in Germany October lo, 1833. They 
became the parents of seven chilihxn. but only tliree are now hving: .\nna. 
tlie wife of Nicholas Schaefer; Maggie, the wife of Adam Gerlach. who is 
mentioned elsewhere in this volume: and Teressa, the widow of Jacob Aust- 
gen. There are now thirty-three grandchildren and two gieat-grandchil- 
dren. Mr. Scherer and his family are members of the St. ^Michael's Catho- 
lic church. No history of this community would be complete without men- 
tion of Mr. Scherer, for, coming to this section of the state at an early 
period in its development, he is now numbered among the honored pioneers, 
his mind bearing the impress of the historic annals of the county. He can 
relate many interesting incidents of those primitive times as well as of the 
later-day progress and improvement, and moreover he has played so prom.- 
inent and helpful a part in the substantial upbuilding of the county that his 
name is inseparably interwoven with its history. 

DR. SAMUEL R. TURNER. 

Dr. Samuel R. Turner, a leading physician and surgeon at 107 First 
National Bank Building, Hammond, has gained a good practice and taken 
a foremost position among the medical fraternity of this city and Lake 
county since taking up his residence here about three years ago. He is a 
man of ability both in his profession and in the performance of his duties 
as a man and citizen, and his career has been most creditable from his early 
years, during which he had to make his own way and earn the means for 
his professional education. 

Dr. Turner was born in Stephenson county, Illinois, near Freeport, May 
13, 1858, a son of Samuel and Jane E. (McGlashon) Turner, natives, re- 
specti\-ely, of Trumbull county, Ohio, and of the state of Vermont. His 
paternal grandfather, Samuel Turner, was a native of Ireland, though of 
Scotch descent, and a son of a life-long Irish citizen. He came to America 
about 1797 and located near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. He was a carpen- 
ter and cabinet-maker b}' trade. He came to Indiana about 1833 and set- 
tled in LaPorte county, and four years later came to Lake county, where 
he settled on a land claim and to which he brought his family in 1838. He 
improved a farm, and was both a prosperous and influential citizen. He died 
there in 1846 at the age of sixty-four. His wife was Jane Dinwiddie, who 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 311 

\vas born in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. January i8, 1783. and died in 1870, 
aged eighty-seven years. Tliey had seven chihh'en who grew to maturity. 

Samuel Turner, the father of Dr. Turner, was a farmer liy occupation, 
and was a young man at the time of his removal to Indiana in 1833. He 
followed farming there up to the breaking out of the Mexican war, and then 
enlisted and served as quartermaster in the American army. He returned 
to his Indiana farm, then moved to Illinois and lived in Stephenson county 
for a few years. In January or February of 1859 he returned to Lake county, 
and lived on a farm in Eagle Creek township from then until his death, 
which occurred April 24, 1864, when he was forty-six years old. His wife 
survived him until October, 1884, when she was fifty years old. They were 
members of the United Presbyterian church. They had two sons, Dr. Turner, 
and William M., of Denver. Colorado. Mrs. Jane E. Turner's father was 
W. G. McGlashon, a native of Canada and of Scotch parents who moved to 
Vermont from Canada. He was a tailor in his younger years, and after 
coming to Indiana among the early settlers engaged in merchandising in 
Crown Point for se^•eral years. He afterward lived on a farm near Crown 
Point. In 1876 he moved to Ottumwa, Iowa, and died there in 
1897, when eighty-one years old. His wife was Ann Duffy, a native of 
Ireland and still living. They had five children. 

Dr. Samuel R. Turner was brought to Lake county when alx)ut a year 
old, and was reared on a farm in Eagle Creek township. He attended the 
district school, and later the high school in Hebron, Porter county. For 
several years he was engaged in teaching during the winter and farming 
during the rest of the year. He then took up the study of medicine, and in 
1888 graduated from the medical department of the University of Louis- 
ville, Kentucky. He has since been engaged in practice for varying periods 
of time at Dyer, Hobart, in Lake county, in Wheatfield, Jasper county, in 
Lansing, Illinois, and about three years ago took up his residence in Ham- 
mond, where he has enjoyed an increasing practice to the present time. 

December 13, 1883. Dr. Turner married Miss Henrietta Burgess, a 
daughter of Henry and Eliza (McCay) Burgess. Six children have been 
born of this union, three sons and three daughters : Albert, who died at the 
age of two years and three months : Susan E. ; Mary Edna ; Harold B. ; 
James Samuel, who died aged five years nine months: and W'ilma Jane. 



312 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Dr. Turner affiliates with Garfield Lodge No. 569. F. & A. M., and also 
with the Maccabees and the Modern Woodmen of America. He is a mem- 
ber of the Lake County Medical Society, the Lidiana State ^Medical Society, 
the Kankakee Valley Medical Society and the American Medical Association. 
He is a stanch Republican in politics, and has served four years as county 
coroner, his term expiring January i, 1904. 

COLONEL REDMOND D. ^^^\LSH. 

Canada has furnished to the L'nited States many bright, enterprising 
young men, who have left that country to enter the business circles of the 
United States with its more progressive methods, livelier competition and 
advancement more quickly secured. Among this number is Colonel Walsh. 
He has somewhat of the strong, rugged and persevering characteristics de- 
veloped by his earlier environments, which, coupled with the livelier impulses 
of the Celtic blood of his ancestors, made him at an early day to seek wider 
fields in which to give full scope to his ambition and industr}- — his dominant 
qualities. He found the opportunities he sought in the freedom and appre- 
ciation of the growing western portion of this country. Though born across 
the border he is thoroughly American in thought and feeling, and is patriotic 
and sincere in his love for the stars and stripes. His career is largely identified 
with the history of railroad building in the middle west, and in more recent 
years he has been a prominent and influential citizen of East Chicago, where 
he is now engaged in real estate operations. 

Colonel Walsh was born in the county of Peterboro, Ontario, Canada, 
and is of Irish descent. His paternal grandfather, William \\'alsh, was born 
on the Emerald Isle and died there at an advanced age. He married a Miss 
INIurphy and they had a large family, including Richard Walsh, whose birth 
occurred in county Cork, Ireland. He was a farmer by occupation and in 
1818 he emigrated to Canada, spending his remaining days in that country 
with the exception of a brief period which was passed in the United States. 
He always engaged in the tilling of the soil, making that a source of income 
whereby he provided for his family. He served in the Patriot war in Canada 
in 1837 and died there at the age of sixty-six years. In early manhood he 
had married Elizabeth Ford, likewise a native of county Cork, Ireland. Her 
father, Dennis Ford, was born in Ireland and died in that country at an 




^^ ^l^KZ^^y^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 313 

advanced age. He reared a large faniih- upon his home farm, where his 
industry and enterprise in the cultivation of the fields brought to him a com- 
fortable living. His grandson, Ted Ford, now lives upon the old home place, 
which comprises two hundred acres of rich land and which has continuously 
been in possession of the family from the eleventh century. It was at one 
time a very extensive tract, but during the reign of Queen Elizabeth it was 
confiscated, although two hundred acres were afterward restored to the 
family. By the marriage of Richard Walsh and Elizabeth Ford thirteen 
children were born, twelve of whomi reached adult age, while six are now 
living: Colonel Redmond D. : Richard, of the Soldiers" Home; Bridget L.. 
the widow of James Haynes, of Corry, Pennsylvania: John, who lives on the 
old homestead in Ontario: Elizabeth, the wife of James Fyfe, also of On- 
tario ; and Ann, the wife of David Kelley, of the same place. 

Colonel Walsh was reared on the old homestead farm in Canada and also 
followed lumbering in his early life. His business career has teen charac- 
terized by intelligent and well-directed efforts, and he may well be called a 
self-made man, a representative of the progress and ad\'ancement which have 
been a manifest factor in the history of .\merica in the nineteenth centnr^^ 
His success has not been the result of genius l^ut of individual and continued 
effort. He acquired a common school education and also received instruction 
from a private teacher for some time. WHiile in Canada he followed lum- 
bering, taking his timber to the Quebec market. He made several trips to 
the United States in search of a location which he regarded as favorable, 
and in 1862, accompanied by his wife, he went to Corry, Pennsylvania. 
There he entered upon a contract to build the Oil Creek Railroad, which he 
completed in 1862, and afterward entered the services of the Pennsylvania 
Railroad Company, assisting in the construction of its line from Franklin to 
Meadville, Pennsylvania. He was superintendent of construction and for 
some time held that position after the completion of the road. Subsequently 
he built the Allegheny Valley Railroad from Warren to Pittsburg, and was 
thus engaged in railroad construction work at the time the Confederate army 
made its way into Pennsylvania. He then enlisted in order to defend this 
state and after participating in the battle of Gettysburg, follovving which 
time the rebels were forced to retreat, he resumed the pursuits of private life. 

In 1865 Mr. Walsh took a prominent part in organizing the Fenian 



314 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Brotherhood. The following year he went west and was engaged as a con- 
tractor and superintendent of work on the Union Pacific Railroad, his time 
being thus occupied until the completion of the line in i86q. In 1870 he 
entered into business relations with the Central Pacific Railroad Company, 
with which he continued for a year, after which he went to Kansas, where 
he was superintendent of the work for the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Rail- 
road. The period of his connection with that company covered three years, 
during which time the line was constructed to connect with the Houston & 
Texas Central road. He afterward became associated with the latter com- 
pany, with which he continued for three years, and then he returned to Penn- 
sylvania, where he built a coal road from Larabee to Bunker Hill. Subse- 
quently he went to the Buckeye state, where he assisted in the building of 
the Scioto Valley Railroad and later he was engaged in the construction work 
of the Springfield, Jacksonville & Pomeroy Railroad, then the St. Clairsville 
& Bellaire Railroad, and afterwards a railroad extending from' Youngstown, 
Ohio, to Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Returning to Ohio he built the valley 
railroad from Canton to Cleveland, and then went to Colorado, where he 
engaged in the construction of the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad over Mar- 
shall Pass, connecting it with the Denver, Rio Grande & Western Railroad 
at Junction City. Another important contract which was awarded him and 
which he faithfully and capably executed was the building of the Alpine 
tunnel, a work which covered two years. He then embarked in mining in 
Colorado, being interested in several diggings. Returning to St. Louis he 
was associated with a partner, ^Michael Coffey, in the construction of the 
standard gauge road from East St. Louis to Cairo, and later he went to 
Nebraska and built the approach to the United Railroad bridge at Rulo, 
Nebraska. There he moved more dirt than any other contractor in the same 
length of time, three hundred thousand yards being taken away in ninety 
days. His next work was the construction of twenty miles of the Atchison, 
Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad from Galesburg west. He built the Elgin, 
Joliet & Eastern Railroad, and then came to East Chicago, Indiana, where 
he built the Chicago, Calumet & Terminal Railroad, the contract being 
awarded him by General Joseph T. Torrence, now deceased. At that time 
General Torrence promised to make a present of a town lot to the first child 
born in the town. Not long afterward there were born to Mr. and j\Irs. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 315 

R. W. O'Brien, the former a nephew of Colonel Walsh, twin lioys. It seemed 
r.ecessary that two lots should be given, one to each child, and General Tor- 
rence gave one lot, while Colonel Walsh gave the other. The boys are now 
young men. 

During his railroad construction work on the site of the present city of 
East Chicago Colonel Walsh became convinced of the advantages which 
might be derived from establishing a home here, and he took up his abode 
here in 1888. It was he who first used an ax in cutting down a tree on the 
present site of the city. He assisted in laying out the town, being the con- 
tractor for all the street work. He also erected ten of the first buildings of 
this city, and he has continued an active factor in the work of improvement 
and progress to the present time. 

In the year 1893 East Chicago was changed from town to a city 
government. The city council of that date made a contract with a contract- 
ing company to build water and light plants. The city council accepted the 
plants before they were half completed and issued the city bonds for the full 
amount of the contract. The water works were useless and cost more to keep 
it in repair than it was worth. Three hundred and thirty thousand dollars 
of bonds were turned over by the city council to the company. R. D. Walsh 
took the company into the courts and knocked out two hundred and ninety- 
six thousand dollars of bonds, and the supreme court of the state of Indiana 
granted a perpetual injunction against ever collecting either interest or prin- 
cipal on these two hundred and ninety-six thousand dollars of bonds. Then 
the city council sold, or rather gave the plants back to the bogus bondholders. 
R. D. Walsh again went into court and took the plants away from the bond- 
holders for the city. All this at his own expense. The plants are now in the 
city's possession. 

In 1889 the residents of the town had an election and incorporated East 
Chicago, and Colonel \\"alsh at that time was elected the first president of the 
town board. He has also been treasurer of the city and trustee, and he is 
a well known and representative resident of this thriving place. Perhaps no 
man is better known in the county than he, because of his great activity in 
business. By his strength of character and mental power he has accjuired a 
handsome competence and by his genial social manner has \\on many warm 
friends. 



316 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Colonel Walsh was married in Ontaiio, Canada, to Miss Hanna Curtain, 
who died in 1871. They hecame the parents of eight children, hut all have 
passed away. 

Many and eventful have l>een the experiences which have come to Mr. 
Walsh in the course of his active business career. While executing iiis con- 
tract in connection with the building of the Union Pacific Railroad he at one 
time became engaged in battle with the Indians on Rock Creek, Wyoming, 
and sustained a gunshot wound in the instep, which forced him to go upon 
crutches for two years. He is now living a retired life in East Chicago. To 
him there has come the attainment of a distinguished position in connection 
with the great material industries of the country, especially in the line of rail- 
road construction — a work the value of which cannot be over-estimated. He 
is a man of distinct and forceful individuality, of broad mentality and mature 
judgment, and he has left an impress for good upon the industrial world. 
He earned for himself an envialile reputation as a careful man of business 
and in his dealings became known for his prompt and honorable methods, 
which win for him the deserved and unbounded confidence of his fellow men. 
For the entire length of his life he has been in sympathy with the indepen- 
dence of Ireland and has always taken an active part in all movements tend- 
ing toward lessening the oppressed sons of Erin. 

IMICHAEL KOZACIK. 

Michael Kozacik is a self-made man who is now the possessor of valu- 
able propert}' interests and who at the outset of his business career was 
empty-handed. He had no inheritance or influential friends to aid him, but 
by determined purpose and perseverance he has gradually accumulated a 
handsome competence. He is now engaged in business as a retail liquor 
dealer at W'hiting. A native of Austria, he was tern on the 29th of Sep- . 
tember, 1873, and was reared in his native country until more than eigh- 
teen years of age, during which period he acquired his education in attend- 
ance at the public schools. He entered upon his business career as a day 
laborer in Austria, receiving but t\\enty-five cents per day. Not content 
with business conditions. howe\'er, in that country, he resolved to test the 
fa\-orable reports which he had heard concerning opportunities in the new 
world, and making arrangements to leave Europe when about eighteen years 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 317 

of age he sailed for America and came from the Atlantic coast to the 
Mississippi valley, establishing his home at Blue Island, Illinois. There he 
remained for but two months, but not succeeding in finding work there he 
removed to Whiting and entered the employ of the Knickerbocker Ice Com- 
pany. His position necessitated his working ten hours per day at a salary of 
one dollar and a quarter. Strong resolution and untiring purpose, however, 
were numberetl among his salient characteristics, and he continued to work 
through the ice-cutting period. He afterward entered the employ of the 
Standard Oil Company at a salary of one dollar and a half per day, and 
continued in the service of that corporation for seven and a half years. He 
was fireman and did various other kinds of work, and during the period 
of his service with the company he managed to save from his earnings the 
sum of thirteen hundred dollars. In the meantime he had also married 
and furnished his home. With the capital he had acquired through his labor 
and economy he invested his money in Whiting property and also established 
a small saloon in a little frame building, where he conducted a retail liquor 
business for a few years. During that period he erected a l:)nilding at In- 
diana Harbor at a cost of six thousand dollars, but becoming convinced of 
the fact that Indiana Hartor was not a desirable place he sold his property 
there, and erected the building in ^^■hiting that he now occupies, at a cost of 
ten thousand dollars. 

Altliijugh Mr. Kozacik had but six dollars when he landed m the United 
States he is to-da)- in good circumstances. He is a liberal man, who h.as 
given generous assistance to the poor, and he is a public-spirited citizen, 
who takes a deep and active interest in general progress and in the material 
development of Whiting. The hope that led him to leave his native country has 
I)een more than realized for in the new world he has won prosperity, gained 
a comfortable home and has also found many friends. In politics, he is a 
strong Democrat and always does all in his power for the interests of that 
party, and. May 3rd, 1904, he was elected to represent the first ward in the 
Whiting city council. 

To the union of Mr. Kozacik and wife have been born four sons, viz: 
Michael. Peter. John and Paul. 

ELI M. BOYD. 

Eli M. Boyd, prominent farmer of Ross township, is one of the very 



318 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

oldest living settlers of Lake county, where he and his well known twin brother 
located over fifty-five years ago, when the country was largely wild and 
much of it still belonging to the government. Their subsequent career is 
a part of the agricultural history of the county, for in time they became 
and still are ranked among the largest farmers of the county. Furthermore. 
they are men of eminent public spirit, interested in the welfare of the county, 
and their efiforts and influence have been felt in diverse ways for the benefit 
and unbuilding of industrial and social institutions. 

Mr. E. M. Boyd was born in Lucus county, Ohio, September lo, 1837, 
so that he is now near the limit of threescore and ten. His father, Alexander 
Boyd, a native of Pennsylvania, died when Eli was seven years old, and little 
is known of his history. He married Elizabeth Kelley, a nati\e of ^^'est- 
moreland county, Pennsylvania, and she lived to be seventy-six years old 
and was married a second time. They had three children, a daughter and 
the twin sons, Eli 'SI. and Levi, who are the principal characters with whom 
this sketch is concerned. 

Mr. Boyd and his brother made their own way from an early age, al- 
though they lived with their mother and step-father for some time. They 
came out to Michigan and thence settled in Lake county, Indiana, in 1848, 
working on their step-father's farm about nine months of the year and at- 
tending school for three months. They were industrious and frugal and 
enterprising in their habits and methods of management, and were not 
long in getting started in the world. Farming has always been the work 
in which they have found the best field for their endeavor, and they are 
now the owners of six hundred acres of land in Ross and Hobart townships, 
containing some of as good soil as is to be found in the county. Mr. E. M. 
Boyd is a member of the advisory board. 

Mr. E. M. Boyd was married, January 6, 1874, to Miss Agnes Hyde, 
and five children were born to them : George, who is married and lives on 
one of his father's farms : Alexander, single : Warren, who is married and 
follows farming; Charles, at home; Alice, aged fifteen, at home. Warren 
was a student at Valparaiso normal. Alice is in the eighth grade in the 
public school and has taken musical instructions. Mrs. Boyd was born on 
Wabash avenue, Chicago, September 8, 1850, a daughter of Michael and 
Mai"y (Mclntoller) Hyde. Her parents are dead. There are six sisters liv- 
ing at present, of her family. She was educated in the common schools. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 319 

The Boyd brothers are ardent supporters of the Repubhcan party, and 
ha\'e always advocated strongly the principles of the platform. The first 
presidential vote they cast was for Lincoln, and they cast their votes for 
Grant, Garfield, Blaine and McKinley. Mr. Eli Boyd has yet in his pos- 
session a vest made in the year 1856, the year that General Fremont was 
the first nominee of the Republican party. The Boyd brothers and wives are 
attendants of the Methodist Episcopal church, and give to the benevolences, 
and all needy are well remembered. 

Mr. and Mrs. Boyd are among the leading people of Ross township, and 
we are pleased to present this sketch. 

DR. H. L. IDDIXGS. 

Dr. H. L. Iddings, of [Merrillville, Ross township, has been the leading 
medical practitioner of ihis town for the past twenty years. He had already 
attained to considerable prominence in his profession before locating here, 
and since then he has not only found in Jilerrillville and the surrounding 
country a large field for his life work, but has also taken an active part in 
various matters pertaining to the general welfare of the community, filling in 
all respects the niche of a broad-minded, public-spirited and enterprising 
citizen. 

Dr. Iddings was born in Ivendalh'ille, Noble county, Indiana, January 
22, 1852, being the eldest of the seven children, four of whom are now de- 
ceased, born to ^^'arren and Hester (Newman) Iddings. Warren Iddings 
was a son of Henry Iddings, a native of Pennsylvania and of Scotch and 
Welsh descent. He was born in Summit county, Ohio, where he remained 
till he was eleven years old, and during the rest of his life followed agri- 
cultural pursuits mainly in Nolile county, Indiana, where his death occurred 
in his seventy-ninth year. His wife was also a native of Ohio, and of Irish 
and German descent. 

Dr. Iddings was a student in the high school at Kendallville, Indiana, 
spent one year in the Fort Wayne Methodist Episcopal College and one 
year at Ann Arbor in the State University. He gained his early training 
mostly by his own efiforts, and before taking up the study of medicine taught 
school for three years. He read medicine with Dr. Gunder Erickson at 
Kendallville, and in 1876 graduated from the Detroit College of Medicine, 



320 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

at Detroit. For four years he was located in practice at Swan, Xoble county, 
Indiana, and was then appointed to tlie office of physician to the state peni- 
tentiary at Michigan City, discharging the duties of that position for two 
years. He came to Merrillville in 1883, and has been in constant and suc- 
cessful practice here ever since. He is examining surgeon for the New York 
Life Insurance Company, the Equitable Life Insurance Company, and is 
district examiner for the Catholic Order of Foresters. 

Dr. Iddings affiliates with the Knights of Pythias at Crown Point. He 
is a strong Republican in politics, and on the ticket of that party was elected 
to the trusteeship of Ross township, which office he held for seven years 
and a half. 

Dr. Iddings married, in 1878, Miss Mary E. Clark, the fourth in num- 
ber of the seven children of Jonathan and Polly (Skinner) Clark. She was 
born in Xoble county. Indiana. There are six children of this marriage: 
John, who is a student in the medical department of Northwestern Lini- 
versity at Chicago: Harold and Harry, twins: Morris, Eva and Fred. 

JOSEPH A. BEATTIE. 

Joseph A. Beattie, who resides on section 34. Center township, and is 
filling the position of township trustee, was born in Winfield township, Lake 
county, Indiana, July 5, 1862. His father was \\'illiam Beattie, a native of 
Ireland, in which country he was reared and married. His wife bore the 
maiden name of Rebecca Ross and was also a native of the Emerald Isle. 
Crossing the Atlantic, they became residents of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 
and thence removed to Lake county, Indiana, locating in Winfield township, 
where Mr. ^^'illiam Beattie carried on agriculttu-al pursuits throughout his 
remaining days. He passed away April 9, 1899, ^"<1 ^""is ^'^'ife ^'so died in 
Lake county, the date of her death being June i, 1899. In their famdy were 
nine children, three sons and six daughters, of whom three died in infancy, 
while six reached years of maturity and four are now living. 

Joseph A. Beattie, the eighth member of the family and the onlv sur- 
viving son, was reared on the old family homestead and is indebted to the 
district schools for the early educational privileges he enjoved. He after- 
ward attended the high school at Crown Point, and when not engaged with 
the duties of the schoolroom he gave his father the benefit of his services by 





Ot/^cuXCJi, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 321 

assisting in the culti\'ati(in and iniproxenient uf the home farm. He remained 
under the parental roof until his marriage, which important event in his life 
occurred on the 27th of No\'ember. 1890, the lady of his choice being Miss 
Gertrude C. Holton. a daughter of Charles V. and Margaret Jane (Cochran) 
Helton, who were early settlers of Lake county. Mrs. Beattie was born in 
this county and was here reared and educated. At the time of his marriage 
Mr. Beattie became a resident of Crown Point, but in 1891 he took charge 
of the Willowdale stock farm, coiuprising four hundred and twenty acres. 
He has since remained as its superintendent, filling the position for twelve 
years in a most acceptable manner. This is the property of William |. Davis, 
of Chicago. In 1892, in connection with Mr. Davis, Mr. Beattie purchased 
three hundred acres of land on section 18, Center township, and this farm is 
also conducted by Mr. Beattie, it being de\ott(l to pasturage and to the rais- 
ing of hay for the stock. He handles about one hundred and fiftv 'lead of 
cattle and horses and feeds all of the grain raised. There is a fine creamery 
upon the place and the cream is shipped principally to the \\'ellington and 
the Stratford hotels and the Chicago & Alton Railway for use on diiu'ng 
cars. Mr. Beattie is recognized as a most enterprising and progressive busi- 
ness man, conducting his farming interests along modern lines, and his 
capable direction of his business affairs and untiring energy have brought to 
him a creditable and gratifying measure of success. 

In his political views Mr. Beattie is a stanch Republican, and in 1900 
he was elected upon that ticket to the position of township trustee of Center 
township for a term of four years, receiving a majority of more than two 
hundred, and recei\'ed sixty-six more votes in the township than were cast 
for the presidential ticket, a fact which indicates his personal popularity 
among the people with whom he has been acquainted from early boyhood. 
He has been the president of the Lake County Agricultural Society for six 
years and was re-elected in 1903. His efforts as the head of this organization 
have been effective in promoting the welfare of the farming class of this 
county. He has taken an active part in all public measures contributing to 
the general good, and is a most progressive and enterprising citizen. Fra- 
ternally he is connected with the Independent Order of Foresters. He has never 
lived outside the borders of Lake county, his interests centering here, and 
among the residents of this portion of the state he has many warm friends. 
He is one of the leading and popular men of Lake county. 
21 



322 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

HON. WILLIAM E. WARWICK. 

Hon. William E. Warwick, who for a number of years has been one 
of the forceful and honored factors in public life and business circles in 
Whiting, has attained to prominence through force of his character, the 
exercise of his talent and the utilization of opportunities. By education and 
training he was well qualified for the important position which he is now 
filling, that of first assistant superintendent for the Standard Oil Company, at 
\Miiting, where is located the largest plant of the kind in the world. He is 
also the vice-president of the First National Bank of \^'hiting. and his busi- 
ness career has won the respect of his contemporaries and excited their warm 
admiration. It is not this alone, however, that entitles him to rank as one 
of the foremost men of his city, for his connection with its public interests 
has been far-reaching and beneficial. He has aided in shaping the municipal 
policy, and his patriotic citizenship has taken tangible form in his zealous 
labors for the improvements instituted through aldermanic measures. He is 
now the mayor of Whiting, and as its chief executive is giving an admin- 
istration characterized by a Inisiness-like spirit and by substantial upbuilding 
and progress. 

Mr. Warwick was born in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, on the 13th of January, 
1862. His father, William P. Warwick, was born in Dahlonega, Georgia, 
but was partially reared in New York city. He became a lumberman of 
Wisconsin, where he has resided for many years, still making his home in 
that state. He wedded Miss Mary Palmer, a native of \\'aukegan. Illinois, 
but her death occurred when she was thirty-five years of age. In the family 
were two daughters, but one is now deceased. 

Hon. William E. Warwick, the only son, was reared in the place of his 
nativity until seventeen years of age, and from the age of six years he 
attended the public schools, thus acquiring a good practical education. On 
leaving Wisconsin he went to Bedford, Iowa, where he lived two years with 
an uncle, who was engaged in farming there. Then he began teaching in the 
country schools of Iowa, and in the meantime he had begim preparation for 
college, wish.ing to gain a more advanced education, the value of which he 
realized. He attended the Iowa State Agricultural College, and during the 
periods of vacation engaged in teaching school in order to meet the expenses 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 323 

of his college course. He was graduated in 1888, and the following year he 
came to Whiting, where he accepted the position of mechanical draftsman 
for the Standard Oil Company, acting in that capacity for about two years. 
He was then made assistant master mechanic, and thus served until the ist 
of December, 1893, when he was transferred to the paraffine department as 
its superintendent. For almost ten years he acted in that capacity, and in 
November, 1903, he was made first assistant superintendent of the works, 
which position he is now filling. This plant is the largest in the world of 
its kind, two thousand men being employed, and the position of I\Ir. War- 
wick is therefore a most important and responsible one. He is yet a com- 
paratively young man, his thorough practical training, his close application 
and his sound business judgment well qualify him for the onerous duties 
that devolve upon him. He is likewise the vice-president of the First Na- 
tional Bank of Whiting. 

In October, 1902, Mr. Warwick was united in marriage to Miss Ella 
Fredenberg. They have a pleasant home in Wheeling which is noted for its 
gracious and warm-hearted hospitality. Fraternally he is a Mason, having 
taken the three degrees of the blue lodge. In his political views Mr. War- 
wick is a gold Democrat, and after the incorporation of Whiting as a city 
in 1903 he was elected its first mayor and is still its chief executive. He came 
to W^hiting when the town was being laid out by the Standard Oil Company, 
which built its extensive works here, and with the growth and progress of the 
place he has since been identified, doing all in his power for its substantial 
improvement and upbuilding. He is a public-spirited citizen, has wrought 
along modern lines of progress, both in his business and his public life, and in 
Whiting he commands the respect and confidence of the great majoritv of 
those with whom he has come in contact. 

CYRUS E. SMITH. 

Cyrus E. Smith, a pronnnent farmer on section 18. Ross township, and 
e.x-county commissioner, has been identified with the various interests of 
Lake county for over forty years, and is a representative citizen in every 
sense of the ^\ ord. He has found in farming a profitable and pleasant vocation, 
which at the age of sixty-five has surrounded him with comfortable circum- 
stances for approaching old age, and his interest and work for the public 



324 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

welfare and his high personal integrity and character have gained him the 
esteem and well thinking of his fellow citizens and business associates 
throughout the county. 

Mr. Smith was liorn September 29, 1839, in Springfield township, Erie 
county, Pennsylvania, on the farm \Ahich his grandfather settled in 1801, 
and on which his father, Amos Smith, was also born and reared. His father 
followed farming, and dies at a young age, in 1852. He married Harriet 
Ellis, a native of Massachusetts, and who died in 1858, leaving four children, 
one daughter and three sons. 

^Ir. Smith, the eldest of the children, was reared and educated in his 
native place, growing up on the old liomestead farm. He continued farming 
in Pennsylvania for two years after his marriage, and in 1863 came out to 
Lake county and located on the farm which he has ever since cultivated and 
owned. Pie placed countless improvements on the place during the subse- 
quent years, and his farm of one hundred and sixty-five acres will now com- 
pare favorably with any in the township. He carries on a general farming, 
stock-raising and dairy business, and has made his operations pay steady 
profits. For about eight years he taught school during the winter seasons 
in Ross township. 

Mr. Smith was married in Erie county, Pennsylvania, October 6, 1861, 
to Miss Ellen Harper, a native of Ashtabula county, Ohio, and a. daughter of 
Benjamin and Ruth (LTnderwood) Harper. The son born of this marriage 
is deceased, and they have an adopted daughter, Pearl. Mr. Smith, as a 
stanch Repu1)lican, first voted for Lincoln, and has taken an active part in 
public affairs. He was elected county commissioner in 1884 and held that 
important county office from 1885 to 1891. He was also appointed trustee 
of Ross township to fill out a vacancy. 

ARTHUR T. COX. 

Arthur T. Cox, treasurer and manager of the Wisconsin Lumber and 
Coal Company, at East Chicago, is an enterprising young man who in his 
active career has followed modern business methods and wrought along lines 
which have resulted in gaining for him a very desirable position in the busi- 
ness world, one that brings to him a good financial return 

He was born near Westfield in Hamilton cou^t^■. Indiana, December 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 325 

9, 1863. and is the oldest of four living children of Stephen and Julia A. 
(Rich) Cox. In the family, however, were seven children, four sons and 
three daughters. The family was established in the south at an early day, 
and the grandfather, Hugh Cox, was a native of North Carolina, where he 
always made his home, passing away in that state when in middle life. 
Through his business career he followed the occupations of farming and mill- 
ing. His wife, ]Mrs. Rebecca Co.x, has also been called to her final rest. They 
were the parents of two sons and four daughters. They held membership in 
the Friends church, and their lives were in harmony with their religious faith. 

Stephen Cox, father of Mr. Cox, was born in North Carolina, was reared 
to the occupation of farming and followed that pursuit throughout his acti\'e 
business career. He came to Indiana in the spring of 1861 and settled near 
Westfield, where he continued to engage in the tilling of the soil until igoi. In 
that year he retired from liusiness life and is now enjoying a well-earned 
rest in Westfield. He married Miss Julia A. Rich, who was born in Indiana 
and was a daughter of Peter Rich, also a native of this state. Her father 
was a farmer by occupation, and li\-ed at Westfield, where he died at a ripe 
old age. He was very prominent and influential in his communitv, and 
various local positions were conferred upon him. His wife, who hnre the 
maiden name of Amy Jessup, also died at an advanced age. In their family 
were a son and three daughters. Mr. Rich was a most earnest and untiring 
worker in the Friends church, and he and his wife were recognized as leaders 
in the congregation of their home locality. Both Mr. and Mrs. Stephen Co.x 
were also ardent workers in the Friends clnuxh. likewise took an acti\-e 
interest in the temperance cause and did all in their power to ]3romote tem- 
perance legislation. In the year 1899 Stephen Cox was called upon to mourn 
the loss of his wife, who flied in the month of July when about si.xty years 
of age. Of their family of four sons and three daughters, those now living 
are Arthur T. : Erwin. who makes his home near Westfield, Indiana: Nietha, 
the wife of E. L. Foulke. of Kansas City, Missouri: and Elsie, who is the 
wife of Charles Baldwin, of W^estfield. 

In retrospect one can see .\rthur T. Cox as a farm boy, working in the 
fields as he assisted his father in the cultivation of the crops, or attending the 
district schools. After he had largely mastered the branches of study taught 
in the local school he entered the Union high school, and subsequently pur- 



326 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

sued a collegiate course and was graduated on the completion c.f the scien- 
tific course in Earlham College, at Richmond, Indiana, with the class of 1890, 
at which time the Bachelor of Science degree was conferred upon him. The 
following year he entered upon his husiness career in connection with the 
lumber tratle. He was employed first in his home town and after\\-ards in 
the county seat at Noblesville, Indiana, where he remained for two years. 
On the expiration of that period he entered the employ of the Nordyke and 
Marmon Company, of Indianapolis, being in their office for a few months. 
Later he was sent out by the firm as collector to different towms in Indiana. 
A year later he entered the employ of the Paxton Lumber Company of Ham- 
mond, in 1894, and was located there until 1897, when he went to Rensselaer. 
where he continued for about a year. He next secured a position in Morocco, 
Indiana, and afterwards went to Lowell, where he accepted the management 
of the Wilbur Lumber Company, of Milwaukee, filling that position in a 
manner entirely satisfactory to the company for three years. He was next 
offered and accepted the position with the Greer-Wilkinson Company at 
Russellville, Indiana, and in February, 1903, he came to East Chicago to act 
as manager of the luml>er yards of the same company at this place. In 
February, 1904, the Greer-Wilkinson Lumber Company sold its interests 
in East Chicago to the Wisconsin Lumber and Coal Company, of which 
concern Mr. Cox became treasurer and manager and one of the stockholders 
and has continued in these relationships up to the present time. In 1904 the 
company erected a two-story lumber warehouse, sixty by one hundred and 
fifty feet, in which is carried an extensive and varied line of building ma- 
terials, and the establishment is one of the flourishing business enterprises 
of East Chicago. 

June 20, 1901, occurred the marriage of Mr. Cox and Miss Laura LuEUa 
Fuller. Mr. Cox is a member of the Society of Friends, while his wife is 
identified through membership relations with the IMethodist Episcopal 
church. Fraternally he is connected with Colfax Lodge No. 378, F. & A. M., 
at Lowell, Indiana, and belongs to Renssalaer Lodge No. 82, Knights of 
Pythias. His political endorsement is given to the Republican party, but 
the honors and emoluments of office have had no attraction for him, as he 
has preferred to give his time and attention to his business interests and to 
the enjoyment of home life. The Co.x household is noted for its hospitality.. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 327 

which is generous and cordial, and Ijotli Mr. and Mrs. Cox have won many 
friends during tlieir residence in East Chicago. 

GEORGE F. GERLACH. 

George F. Gerlacii, the prominent and well-known merchant of St. John, 
Lake county, is a self-made and successful business man. He began life for 
himself at an early age, finding in school teaching the first stepping stone of 
progress, and at the same time acquainted himself with the details of mer- 
cantile affairs. He is and has been for some years an important factor in 
business circles of St. John township, and is always found identified with 
the side of progress and general advancement in material, social and educa- 
tional movements. 

Mr. Gerlach was born in Bavaria, Germany, January 24, 1841. His 
father, Michael Gerlach, was a native of the same country, and in 1846 
emigrated with his family to America. He settled at Harper's Ferry, West 
Virginia, where he followed his trade of carpenter for about eleven years. 
In 1857 he emigrated further west, locating in St. John township. Lake 
county, Indiana, where he turned his attention to farming pursuits. He 
bought eighty acres of land, improved it, and for the remainder of his life 
made fanning a successful enterprise. He died at the age of seventy-four 
years. Flis wife was Agnes Catherine Wartheim, a native of Germany, and 
who also attained the age of seventy-four years. They were highly respected 
in Lake county, and are to be counted among the early settlers who opened 
up and developed the farming regions. They were the parents of seven 
children, one of whom died young, but the others, four sons and two daugh- 
ters, are still living. 

Air. George F. Gerlach, the eldest of the family, was about five years 
old when he crossed the ocean to America, and about sixteen when the 
family came to Lake county. He began his education in Virginia, and later 
attended the St. Vincent's College in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania. 
After coming to Lake county he began his independent career by teaching 
school, beginning at the age of seventeen and continuing the profession for 
about three months of the year during the following ten vears, in St. John 
and Hanover townships. What time he was not teaching he employed by 
acting as clerk in the store of Henrv and F. P. Keilmann, at St. Tohn. In 



328 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

1867 he married and in the same year began business in partnership with Mr. 
F. P. Keihnann. They carried on a general merchandise business until 
1885, when the partnership was dissolved, and since then Mr. Gerlach has 
been conducting his store alone and at his present location. He has a long 
established and prosperous business, carrying a stock valued at about sixteen 
thousand dollars, and is recognized as one of the foremost business men of 
the county. He also buys and ships grain and live-stock. This position in 
the world of affairs is the more creditable when it is remembered that Mr. 
Gerlach commenced his career with nothin.g except his own ambition and 
industrious habits. 

Fie has also performed his part in public affairs. He has been a Demo- 
crat since the casting of his first vote, but maintains an independent attitude 
in local affairs, voting for the best man. He has been a justice of the peace, 
and is now a notary public. He is also interested in the agricultural develop- 
ment of Lake county, for he owns about nine hundred acres of land in dif- 
ferent parts of the county. 

Mr. Gerlach married, in 1867. Miss Margaret Keilmann. and they are 
the parents of nine children: Katie, wife of Peter Schmidt: Frank, in his 
father's store: Joseph M.. also in the store; Maggie, wife of John Stoltz, 
who is employed in Mr. Gerlach's store; Lizzie, wife of Michael Weis. of 
Ross tow-nship ; George and Charles, who are in their father's store ; and 
Lena and Clara, who are still in school. The children were all born in St. 
John township. Lake county. 

WILLIAM J. GLOVER. 

William J. Glover has almost completed his second term as recorder of 
Lake county, and during an eight years' incumbency of that office has set a 
standard of efficiency and administrative ability which is a matter for pride 
to himself and for profit and good to the county. Like most of the worthy 
citizens of Lake county, Mr. Glover has spent his years in labor providing 
for the material wants of himself and family, and is therefore a popular man 
in the true sense of that word. He first became known to Lake county as an 
employe of the iron mills of East Chicago, and for the past fifteen or more 
years has been an upright, puljlic-spirited and hard-working citizen, always 
steadily progressing toward a higher goal of endeavor. As a public official 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 329 

in varicius places of trust he has sliown himself worthy of honor and con- 
fidence and an excellent depositary of the county's administrative afTairs. 

Mr. Glover is a Pennsylvanian hy birth and rearing. He was born at 
Bolivar, January 26. 1856, and is of Scotch lineage in only the third genera- 
tion from the original American progenitor. His paternal grandfather, 
James Glover, was born in the city of Edinburg, Scotland, and came to the 
United States something over seventy years ago. He settled in Maryland, 
and died at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, at ninety-two years of age. Rolaert 
Glover, the father of the Lake county recorder, was born in Mandand, and 
is now seventy-one years old, residing in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. He has 
been a stationary engineer nearly all his life. His wife is also living at the 
age of sixty-seven, and her maiden name was Clara Corsin. 

Mr. William J. Glover was taken to Pittsburg in childhood, and was- 
educated there in the public schools. He found employment at different 
lines of work before he entered the iron mills, and for some twenty-two years 
he was employed in the iron mills in Pittsburg and in East Chicago. He came 
to Chicago, Illinois, in 1882, and in 1888 settled at East Chicago. The latter 
was a mere town at that time, and he was one of the first settlers. In addi- 
tion to his daily work he became identified with the public life of the place, 
and before long was taking an active part in Republican politics. He was 
elected and served one term as treasurer of East Chicago, and was elected 
to the city council for two terms. While serving in the latter position he was 
elected, in 1896. to the office of recorder of Lake county, and then severed 
his connection with affairs in East Chicago and mo\'ed to Crown Point, where 
he has since made his home. He was chosen for a second term as recorder 
in 1900, so that he has ser\ed nearly eight years. He has always been a 
Republican, and is a man of popular and genial manners, just such a one as 
the people of a community pick out as a representative citizen and choose for 
their various administrative offices. 

Mr. Glover has affiliations with the Masons, the Elks, the Foresters, the 
Maccabees, and the Amalgamated Association of Iron, Steel and Tin Work- 
ers. He was married in June. 1881. to Miss Elizabeth Owens, of Pittsburg. 
Pennsylvania. They have fi\'e children: Robert S.. Edward C. Florence M., 
William J.. Jr., and Helen. 



330 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

\\ILLIAM HENRY WOOD. 

William Henry Wood, general merchant at Deep River, has been the 
leader m the business affairs of this community for many years. In fact, 
the Wood family, grandfather, father and sons, have been closely identified 
with industrial and commercial interests of Ross township as long as any 
other family still existing in the county, and they have kept fully abreast 
of the tide of progress and development which has advanced Lake county 
from a wilderness to one of the richest and most prosperous counties of the 
state. 

The pioneer of the family was John Wood, grandfather of the above 
named, whO' came out from the east to Lake county, Indiana, before the 
official separation and organization of the counties of Porter and Lake. He 
was a miller by occupation, and by building and operating the old grist and 
saw mill at Deep River supplied the early settlers with commodities abso- 
lutely essential to civilization and modest comfort. His mill was one of the 
first in the county, and he carried on his business here for many years. He 
was of English and Scotch descent. 

George Wood, the father of William H. Wood, was born in Massa- 
chusetts, and in boyhood came out to Lake county with his parents, being 
reared, educated and married in this county. He engaged in general mer- 
chandising and milling at Deep River during most of his active career, and 
was a prominent and influential man in the surrounding country. He was 
a member of the Unitarian church at Hobart. His death occurred when he 
was fifly-nine years old. He married Mary J. Digerd, who was born in 
Buffalo, New York, of Irish descent, and is still living. They were the 
parents of six children, four of whom reached adult age. 

W^illiam Henry Wood, the fourth child and third son of this family, 
was born in Deep River, Lake county, July 2, 1865, and was reared and has 
spent all his life at this place. After attending the common schools he 
entered the business department of the Northern Indiana Normal School at 
Valparaiso, where he was graduated in two years, and then returned to Deep 
River. He was with his father in the creamery business for two years, and 
then he and his brother Eugene bought out their father and carried on the 
general store and creamery in partnership for six years. Mr. Wood then 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 331 

bought out his brother, and lias been very successfully conducting the mer- 
cantile business ever since. He is also vice-president of the Ohio Standard 
Oil Company, at Amsterdam, Ohio, and has various other business interests. 

As a life-long Republican he has taken much interest in public affairs. 
He is now candidate for tOAvnship trustee, and was at one time on the ad- 
visory board. He has been the postmaster of Deep River for the past ten 
years, the office being located in his store. He is a Mason affiliating with 
Hobart Lxidge No. 357. He is well known in business and social circles, and 
his store is up to date and a large one for a place the size of Deep River. He 
carries about four thousand dollars' stock, and has a large trade from all the 
surrounding country. , 

Mr. Wood married, in 1894, Miss Martha Battia, of Middle Falls, New 
York. They have two children, Olive and Raymond. 

HENRY C. BATTERMAN. 

Henry C. Batterman, prominent in the industrial, mercantile and finan- 
cial affairs of Dyer, St. John township, began his career at this place some 
thirty years ago, with his trade and his character as his principal capital, 
and during the intervening period has come to be one of the most influential 
business men of this part of Lake county. He has been prominently identi- 
fied with nearly all the affairs of Dyer, whether of a business, social or polit- 
ical or whatsoe\'er nature, and is an all-round worthy citizen whom all 
esteem and hold in highest regard. 

Mr. Batterman is a brother of Edward Batterman, the well known 
business man of Hobart, and in whose personal history on other pages of 
this work will be found the parental and ancestral records. Mr. H. C. Batter- 
man was born in Vv'ill county, Illinois, October 10, 1855, ^"^ was reared 
and educated there. He learned the harness-making business, and at the 
age of twenty, in 1875, came to Lake county, where he continued to work at 
his trade, following it altogether for twenty-two years. He prospered from 
the first, and has been on the up-grade ever since he started oiit on his own 
hook. In 1894 he established a livery business in Dyer, and has carried it on 
very successfully to the present time. In 1900 he opened his machine and 
blacksmith shops and agricultural implement house, and in these lines does 
a large and steadily increasing business. He took a leading part at the 



332 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

organization of the First National Bank at Dyer, and is a director and the 
vice-president of that substantial financial institution. He also owns stock 
in the creamery at Dyer, and is secretary and treasurer of the Horse Breed- 
ers' Association at Dyer. He has had an annual trade in his implement arid 
shops enterprise amounting to over ten thousand dollars, and his Ijusiness 
push and energy are continually increasing his hold on the commercial and 
mdustrial affairs of the county. In public matters and political questions be 
has always adhered to the principles and policies of the Republican party. 
He has served as superintendent of roads and was on the township advisory 
board. Tie has also been active in religious afifairs, and is an official member 
of the Dyer Union church. 

Mr. Batterman has been married three tunes. His first wife was Mary 
Richart, by whom he had one son, Joe B. The second marriage was with 
Maggie Young, and his present wife was Miss Helen Richart, a sister of his 
first w'ife. They have two living children, Carrie and Johanna. Fraternally 
lie is a member of the Order of the Foresters of America. Council No. i6, 
at Dyer, and he was a member of the High Order of Foresters. 

JAMES A. PATTERSON. 

James A. Patterson, an attorney at law engaged in practice in Indiana 
Harbor since the summer of 1902, was born in Sharon, Pennsylvania, on the 
31st of August, 1867, and is one of a family of eight children, four sons and 
four daughters, whose parents are William and Mary (McAlpin) Patterson. 
His paternal grandfather, William Patterson, Sr., was born in Scotland, 
belonging to one of the old families of that country. Emigrating to America, 
he spent his last days in Canada, where he died at the very advanced age of 
ninety-two years. He had long devoted his energies to agricultural pursuits 
and in that way had provided for his family, numbering his wife and four or 
five children. 

William Patterson, Jr., was born in Catron, Scotland, and after arriving 
at years of maturity he married Miss Mary McAlpin, a native of Kilmarnock, 
Ayr.sbire. She belonged to a family numbering several daughters and her 
father died in Scotland when he had attained a venerable age. William 
Patterson followed mining during much of his life. \M:en a young man he 
left Scotland and went to Australia, where he was engaged in mining gold. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 333 

He afterward emigrated to Canada, locating in a pioneer district, and there 
he carried on farming for three or four years, at the end of which time he 
went to Pennsylvania. On leaving that state about 1876 he journeyed west- 
ward to Illinois, settling" at Coal City, where he engaged in mining coal, but 
his last vears were spent in the Indian Territor}', where he died in 1885, ''■^ 
the age of fift}--eight years. His wife still survives him and is now seventy- 
six years of age. Like her husband she is a member of the Presbyterian 
church, and through many years has shaped her life by its teachings and 
precepts. To this worthy couple w"ere born four sons and four daughters, 
and six are yet living: Margaret, who is the wife of D. W. Frye, of Coal 
City. Illinois; Helen, the wife of David H. \\^ilson, also a resident of Coal 
City; \\'illiam M., who is living in St. Louis, Missouri; Robert J., a resident 
of Moberly, Missouri ; James A. ; and Elizabeth, the wife of Cornelius Clark, 
of Coal City, Illinois. 

James A. Patterson was a lad of about nine years when with his parents 
he removed to Coal City, Illinois, where the days of his youth were passed 
and his early education was acquired. He afterward pursued a liusiness 
course in a commercial college at Leavenworth, Kansas, and later he occupied 
a position as bookkeeper for four or five years. He then went to Valparaiso 
College and was graduated from the scientific and literary departments, so 
that he gained a broad general knowledge to serve as an excellent foundation 
upon which to rear the superstructure of professional learning. Following 
the completion of his normal work at Valparais(T. he took vi\i the study of law 
in the Chicago Law School of Chicago, from which he was gradtiated in 
1898, and the same year was admitted to the bar. He has since engoged in 
practice, covering a period of six years, and on the ist of April. 1902, he 
opened an office in Indiana Harljor, where he has since been located. His 
clientage is continually growing and has connected him with much of the im- 
portant litigation tried here. He is thorough and painstaking in the prepara- 
tion of a case, clear and concise in argument, cogent and logical in his reason- 
ing, and has attained a creditable position among the younger members of 
the Lake county bar. 

On the 24th of June, 1898, occurred the marriage of Mr. Patterson and 
Miss May A. Wiles, a daughter of Truman B. and Abigail E. Wiles. Abigail 
E. Wiles died June 17. 1904, at Mabel, Minnesota. They reside at 3729 



?34 HESTORY OF LAS;^ 'J 

^_ :i - ^ : . _ ^- , '.15 ot Fydiias 

ami Modem Waotituet firstsmrtiesw ami bis wxtee is GomaBEtef wi& tfte laiiies" 

3ri3ilraiies '^f bcjtfe. Sfe. too^ is a graifcale nE TalpsE^so Ccllege. ami t&ef 

befttt Gccapr an etrria&Ie posEteJn; in. t5e scctaE circies- wBaaie cdirEre ami nrfgi'- 

IrgfeEice pre&nifnaDe. 

GOTHJEB MUESIC^ 

,- — -. ,:, -,-..._.,•_ ffee^Tcs 33 6e — —"■----■ :niciig: tie cM. aeEsSes q£ 

tSfi CL -^ -;^_.„ ._ tor Ere oas res: ' cwenrr-iore years. wMca 

tase c»rve3 afiiH^c iSs£ ercire gecictt ot tiiE c3?"'s growtfe. ami dev^cpineit tn 
its preait r Fn . Fvutg: g iog c irtT o iis- Ai: t&e age e£ neatEy- ^jbty jkears. &e s 
aisc- one m t&e- ^tranfe Gt tfee c&»:. ami Ms diaractsr ami perscit are weie-- 
a&fe ami respectm irt tfee eyes at aE cmzsas oz HsxmisomL wfe esDeem Frim 
Betfii ECT Ms Lengrft oc yeir= "' ' "' -^ " " ' " = """ ■■" iie Ml? ~>— e 

afeirs a£ cit?ir. ccfunrr. scl.- _: - ._- -. - .-- ^ a. natui" — : -i: 

nirwards of llkLv yeairs agp^ 

He was- 6csgi m tfee pEowmce ax Bramferrfna^^ Geinai^. in. sS-.^ ami is 
now ifte enty atrororg^ oik '3* iSe khit cfrrTrfrgL che snt ami tfiree dangficers. 
ficni tD nrrrs tranr anmf CfeistiaEna: (Hamie:- — idL tfre ssonie- oi wMmt 

was a 'J es Li iau fiirmer ami ifed M tfte f. '■oit tS<:r " '' -eti x 

sr' ■" •"■•? anET trv Ms wtk. Tliev- wer'i .._- trTmrg _„c .^;a"rraf 

g^ -g- c?r Mir- M-mB3ic5i ifed in Gerrnany wfigt cibse to ssty-agM jeirs 

oM. ami tfee m i a i *■« n a li gcamiatfi^ was a feuauKL ami (ffiesi irt Gaaaamr. 

GcfttHsis Mtteirc&i was r^areti he Cesinairr ami receiweii a g^od! esfmmicit 
in. tfte conmicit sc&ccls. He tsjck op Mes tfatfes; by ferMmg t&e wensers 
trajfe He was a scjiiiie" M t&e rcj^i^ armies &ir foe v^irs. beng: a. j ta ac m C 
ami also fiir s evo r al yeais was ovorsee: ■^nnf t^-t— ' i^^ i large escit& He 
was mamxef freSTre leivMg t&e- clti e:^mLLy. - lycrtam: niC've of Ms 

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tD HJessscflle. r m frana. wfe:E- &e btmsfe a soesK Sirm ami tSewotm MmseEf 
t _ ■ " : "5. Iir ' ■ • jeft tie amr tr> 

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rrfng ami grrjgxess to ward a grosperars cry. He has Irveti Lnae ev^ arrce. 
Hs &^c h mJt a large LsLaime Mmse 'Jil Somir HcMnait scree: admrnrng Ms 
ptesem. resdemre. amt sSkt Irving litH^ se^foraL years soM 3: to Ms son 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 335 

Gustav. In 1897 he built his present substantial brick residence at 216 South 
Hohman street. 

Mr. Muenich is a veteran of the Civil war in this country, having en- 
listed in 1S62 in Company I, Seventy-second Illinois Infantry, and served 
about a year, after which he returned to his home at Hessville. Mr. and Mrs. 
Muenich are both members of the Lutheran church, and in politics he has 
always adhered to Republican principles and policies. 

August 8, 1853. Mr. Muenich was married to Miss Anna Xatke, a 
daughter of Christian and Maria (Wannock) Xatke. Both her paternal and 
her maternal grandfathers died so long ago that no knowledge of their his- 
tor}' is obtainable, but the name of the former's wife was Maria (Rockhill) 
Natke, and that of the latter's Katharina ^Vannock. Mrs. Muenich's father 
was a farmer, and in 1857 he emigrated with his wife and family from Ger- 
many to America, and after a short residence in Chicago located at Hessville, 
where he remained till his death, in 1887, at the age of eighty-one. His 
wife died in 1877, aged seventy-four. They had three children : Anna, the 
wife of Mr. !Muenich ; Elizabeth, wife of Joseph Hess ; and Martin Natke. 

Four sons and one daughter were born to ^Ir. and Mrs. IMuenich : Carl 

Gustav is a contractor in Hammond : he married ]\Iiss ^laria Bellof . and the}' 

have one daughter, Etta. Gustav Adolph Muenich died at the age of five 

and a half years. Rudolph is a paperhanger: he married Alvina Zachholz, 

and their three children are George, Ida Anna Alvina and Bertha. ]\Iaria 

married Henr\- Huehn, now deceased, and they had five children. Emma, 

^^'illiam. Henry. ]\Iyrtle and Arthur. Edw-ard Muenich follows the trade of 

carpenter: b}' his wife, Alice Benedict, he has five children, Rebecca, Elmer, 

Lola. Roy and Arthur. 

HENRY L. KEILMAN. 

Henrj- L. Keilman, president of the First National Bank of Dyer and a 
prominent farmer of St. John township, has spent all his life in Lake county 
and is of the third generation of the well known family who located in this 
count}- sixty years ago. He has spent most of his active years in farming 
pursuits, which he has followed for over thirtv- years, and he has resided 
on his present fine farmstead for twenty-five years. Outside of his financial 
and agricultural interests he has concerned himself in a public-spirited manner 
with the administrative affairs of his county and township, and is everywhere 



336 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

known as a good citizen, a good neiglilx)i' and a man of unusual energy 
and business capacity. 

Mr. Keilman was born in St. Jobn township, September 22, 1856, being 
the eldest son of Leonard and Lena (Austgen) Keilman, who in childhood 
cnme from their native land of Germany. His father, who is still among 
the active and enterprising business men of St. John township, is written of 
elsewhere in this work, and various details of family history are to be found 
under the name Keilman in various portions of the history. 

Mr. Keilman was reared in his native township, and was educated in 
the district school and then attended, in 1872, Pionono College, near Mil- 
waukee, Wisconsin. On his return home he at once took up farming, and 
after his marriage, in 1879, located on the farm where he still resides. He 
owns three hundred acres, and does general farming, stock-raising and 
dairving. At the time of the organization of the First National Bank in 
Dyer, in 1903, he was elected its president, which ot^ce he still holds, and 
his direction of the bank's affairs has been most satisfactory to the stock- 
holders and is resulting in giving the institution considerable prestige among 
the business interests of St. John township. 

Mr. Keilman was elected, on the Democratic ticket, to the office of 
trustee of St. John township, in 1894, and he held that office for five years 
and three months. He and his family are members of the Catholic church, 
St. Joseph's church at Dyer. 

Lt 1879 Mr. Keilman married Miss Maggie Schaefer, who is also a 
native of St. John township. They have eight children, all born on the 
old homestead farm in St. John township, as follows: William H., Frank 
L., Emma, Frances, Raymond, Leonard, Verna and Helen. 

DENNIS PALMER. 

Dennis Palmer, old settler and man of affairs of Lake county, has been 
for many years a leading spirit in the commercial and industrial development 
of Lake county and particularly of that portion where the town of Palmer 
is situated, which was founded on his land and named as a lasting memorial 
to his life and services in behalf of the community. He was one of the influ- 
ential residents who contributed of their own means and lent their vigorous 
efforts for railroad building in this county. Many enterprises of private 






^^99UJi ^yi^^^^^^A^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 337 

business and public nature liave engaged bis attention during a long life of 
over seventy years, and bis place in tbe county is one of bonor, bigb esteem 
and most public-spirited and useful performance of bis part in life. 

Mr. Palmer was liorn in Lorain county. Obio, August 21, 1830. His 
fatber, also named Dennis, was born in Massacbusetts. wbence be moved to 
New York state, and from tbere to Obio. settling first in Lorain county, tben 
in Crawford county, and aliout 1854 came to Lake county. Indiana, wbere 
he passed his declining years and died at tbe age of eighty-two years. His 
wife, Olive Terril, was a nati\'e of Connecticut, Init was reared in tbe early 
times of Lorain county, Ohio, and died in that state at tbe age of eighty. 

Mr, Palmer was tbe only son of his parents" five children. He was seven 
years old when be moved to Crawford county, Ohio, where be was reared. 
His education was accjuired in one of tbe primitive old log-cabin schools. He 
remained in that county for two years after bis marriage, and in 1854 moved 
to Mason county, Illinois, but after six months came to Lake county and took 
up his first residence in W^infield, W'infield township. He was tbere six years 
and then came to tbe place wbere he has ever since made bis place of- residence, 
for over forty years. During his more active career he engaged in various 
kinds of business, in the raising and shipping of stock, merchandising and 
farming. A town was laid out on his land in 1882 and named in his 
honor. At present he owns only one hundred and seventy acres in this 
vicinity, but once was possessor of six bun(h-ed. Much of the growth and 
prosperity of this region is due to bis active eft'orts. He has one son, Richard, 
who is in the real estate business in Kansas City, Missouri. He owns lands 
in Kansas, but these are under the control of this son and his grandson. 

Mr. Palmer started out in life without a dollar, and the story of bis life 
is one of self-achievement, industry and capable business management. He 
therefore deserves tbe esteem which is accorded him in Lake county, and tbe 
weight of bis opinions has in many ways been felt throughout tbe county. 
He has in the main retired from active pursuits, and confines most of his 
attention to lending money and dealing in securities. He has been a strong 
Republican since the organization of tbe party, and has served as township 
trustee one term, and was justice of tbe peace for twenty years. He was an 
old-line Whig and at tbe birth of tbe Republican party espoused its prin- 
ciples and voted for Fremont, then Lincoln, Garfield, Blaine and McKinley. 



338 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

He helped in getting the hnes of the Pennsyl\-ania and the Erie raih-oads run 
through Crown Point, wliich resulted in much of the subsequent prosperity 
of that town as a commercial center. He was the first man to sign the right 
of way and give a mile of his own land to the Erie road, doing this with the 
understanding that the line should be constructed through Crown Point. He 
also assisted in taking up subscriptions for the Pennsylvania Railroad, signing 
his own name for one hundred dollars. Through many such enterprises he 
has made his influence felt for good in Lake county, and is one of the best 
known and truly successful men of the county. 

Air. Palmer was married, May 12, 1852, to ]\Iiss ]\Iary Wilson, and of 
the two children, both sons, born to them, one is living, Richard, also men- 
tioned above. Richard Palmer was born February 17. 1853. and was reared 
in this county, being educated in the common schools. He has been engaged 
in the stock, real estate and the banking lines of business, and for some time 
he resided in Monona county, Iowa, and carried on stock, banking and mer- 
cantile enterprises. He marriefl. November 4. 1875. Miss !Mary E. Fargo, 
bv wliiim he had one son, ]\Iark S. D.. \vho was educated in tlie common 
schools and at the Valparaiso College, and is now postmaster at Eskridge, 
Kansas ; at the time of recei\'ing his official notice he was the youngest post- 
master in the United States. This grandson of ]\Ir. Palmer was married on 
August I, 1899, to Miss May E. F. Parsonage, who was born in Wabaunsee 
county, Kansas, June 17, 1879, '"'^r parents being still living and farmers in 
Wabaunsee county, and she received a high school education and for some 
time was a teacher. The one daughter of this marriage. Lois Z(ie. is thus 
a great-grandchild of Mr. and Mrs. Palmer, so that there are four genera- 
tions alive at the present time. Mark S. D. Palmer is a Republican. ha\-ing 
cast his first vote for McKinley, and fraternally he is associated with Tent 
No. 79, of the Maccabees, at Eskridge, and with the Ancient Order of United 
Workmen No. 165. 

Mr. Richard Palmer's first wife died Deceml;er 10, 1880. and i)y his 
second wife he has six children, as follows: John R. : Alice, who is in the 
high school : Maude, in school ; Fayette. Lucile and Katie On February 27, 
1902. Mr. Richard Palmer married Mrs. ]Mary E. (Hatterly) Luth, who was 
])orn in Harrison county, Iowa, November 5, 1866, being a daugliter of 
Tames and Flannah Hatterly. She was educated in the common schools, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 339 

finishing at the Shenandoah high school, and she taught in Iowa for a year 
and a half. By her marriage to Henry Luth one son, Leslie E., was horn, 
he being now fifteen years old and a student in the public schools of Kansas 
City, where his parents reside. Richard Palmer moved to Kansas City in 
June, 1903, and engaged in the real estate business. He is a Republican, 
having cast his first vote for Hayes, and he has always supported those prin- 
ciples. His wife is a member of the Christian church, and they are generous 
in regard to the benevolences. 

Mrs. Dennis Palmer was born in Wyandotte county, Ohio, Feljruary 
1*9, 1833, and was a daughter of Daniel and Sarah (Taylor) Wilson. She 
was one of thirteen children, and six are yet living. She was reared in her 
native state, and her first school was a log cabin, with a mud and stick chim- 
ney, with benches of slabs resting on four pins for legs, and the desk for the 
older scholars a long board resting on pins driven into the wall. She used 
the goosequill pen, usually fashioned out with the knife of the master, who, 
for a portion of her school days, was none other than her future husband. 
Mr. Palmer. Much more might be related of those early pioneer days. 

For half a century have Mr. and Mrs. Palmer traveled the journey of life 
together, sharing the joys and sorrows as the}- have followed one close on the 
other. And now at the eventide of life, when the sun of their careers is fast 
setting, thev can look back over the past years as over a golden harvest field 
where the garnered sheaves of golden deeds lie before God and man as proofs 
of their noble characters and generous endeavors, so that all — son, grand- 
children and all who come after them — may rise up and call them blessed. 

REV. H. PH. WILLE. 

Rev. H. Ph. W'ille has l.ieen pastor of the First Lutheran church of 
Whiting since 1891 and was the first minister regularly located here. Dur- 
ing the years which have since come and gone he has succet^ded in build- 
ing up a strong religious organization and one which has had potent and 
far-reaching effect in the moral development and progress of this part of 
the state. \Mdelv known and resijected by all with whom he has come in 
contact, the life record of Re\'. W'ille cannot fail to prove of deep interest to 
many of our readers. He was born in Hamburg, Germany, on the 18th 
of December, 1843, when his parents were en route for America. His father. 



340 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Philip W'ille, was a native of Prussia and was a farmer by occupation. He 
came to tlie United States in tlie spring of 1844, locating near }vlil\vaukee 
Wisconsin, and he lived to enjoy the privileges and opportunities of the new 
world for forty years, passing away in 1884, when seventy-four years of 
age. His -wife, who Ixire the maiden name of Charlotte Tews, was abo a 
native of Prussia and is still living at the very advanced age of eighty- 
eight years. They became the parents of nineteen children, but only six 
reached adult age. 

Rev. PI. Ph. W'ille is the only surx'iving son, and was but three months 
old when his parents arrived in America. He was educated in the public 
and parochial schools near ^Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and in Martin Luther 
College at Buffalo, New York. He also attended Concordia Seminary at 
St. Louis, Missouri, where he was graduated with the class of 1870 on the 
completion of a theological course which prepared him for the active work of 
the ministry. His first charge was at California, Missouri, where he re- 
mained for about four years. He then removed to Concordia, Missouri, 
where he acted as pastor of the Lutheran church for twelve years, and on the 
expiration of that period he accepted a call for the church at Geneseo, Illinois, 
w'here he continued his ministerial labors for five years. In 1891 he arrived 
in Whiting. It was then but a mere village and he became the first regular 
pastor in this place. He began here with a membership of only forty, but 
his labors have resulted in great and substantial growth in the church, which 
now has an enrolled membership of over three hundred. He is also inter- 
ested in the building up of a congregation at Indiana Harbor. His active 
connection with the ministry covers thirty-four years, during which time he 
has not been denied the full harvest nor the aftermath. \\'ith conscientious 
zeal he has devoted his time and energies to his holy calling, and his pulpit 
addresses, his pastoral labors and his personal influence and example have 
been strong and forceful elements for the betterment of mankind and the 
upbuilding of the church in the various localities in which he has resided. 

On the 1st of September, 1864. Rev. Wille was united in the holy bonds 
of matrimony to Miss Minnie Plenning. who was born and reared in Buf- 
falo, New York, and is a daughter of G. and ^linnie (Voelker) Henning. 
The}'' have become the parents of ten children, five sons and five daughters : 
Edward, a farmer now residing in Nebraska; Lillie. the wife of Paul A. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 341 

Scliolz. who follows farming near La Porte, Indiana; Hernian C, who is 
proprietor of a grocery store in Chicago: Emma, wlio is engaged in (h-ess- 
making in Whiting; Otto, wlio died at the age of thirty years: Clara, the 
wife of George Hornecker: Julius, who is engaged in the tinner's husiness in 
^\'hiting; Ella, the wife of William Clock, of Whiting: Rudolph, who is 
employed as a salesman in a grocery store in Chicago : and Mollie, at home. 
The family is well known in \Miiting, where they have resided for twelve 
years, and the hospitality of the best homes is very cordially extended to 
them. Mr. \^"ille commands the respect of people of all denominations, and 
while he is firm in his advocacy of what he believes to be right he is also 
charitable in his opinions and of kindly, generous spirit. 

A. MURRAY TURXER. 

A. Murray Turner, president of the First National Bank of Hammond, 
is a life-long resident of Lake county, and for some years has been prom- 
inently identified with its business and financial affairs. He has shown great 
ability in promoting and organizing enterprises whose results are for the 
welfare of the community and people at large, and his influence and work 
in this direction have been of great benefit to Lake county. He is essentially 
a business man, but has also directed some of his energies tc politics and 
social matters, and is a representatixe citizen of the city of Hammond. 

He was born in Crown Point, Indiana, October 3, 1859, being a son of 
David and Caroline (Bissell) Turner, The family is one of the oldest of 
Lake county, and the business and agricultural interests of the county have 
felt the stimulating control of three generations of the name. Grandfather 
Turner was a native of the north of Ireland, whence as a small boy be 
came to America with a family to whom he had been bijund out for a term 
of years. He grew to manhood in Trumbull county, Ohio, and in 1837 
came to Lake county. Indiana, where he spent the remainder of his sixty 
years in farming pursuits. His wife, named Patterson, died in Eagle Creek 
town.ship. Lake county, at the age of eighty-seven years, and they had a 
large family. 

David Turner, the father of the Hammond banker, was born in Ohio, 
and during the early years of his manhood followed farming. He came to 
Lake county in 1837. For some years he was the only merchant in the town 



342 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

of Crown Point. He served as state senator from 1858 to 1862, and was 
then appointed United States assessor by President Lincoln, holding that 
office until its abolishment. He was president of the First National Bank 
of Crown Point for a number of years and died in February, 1890, at the 
age of seventy-three years. He was a Republican in politics, and a Pres- 
bvterian. His wife, who still survives and resides with her son, A. Mur- 
ray, is a native of Ohio. Mrs. Mary Brunot, of Greensburg, Pennsylvania, 
is a sister of Mrs. David Turner, and they two are the only survivors of 
the family. David Turner and wife had seven children, all of whom are 
still living: John Bissell Turner, of Cedar Rapids, Iowa: Sarah J., wife 
of Thomas W. Monteith, of Port Huron, Michigan: Emma, wife of I. C. 
Emory, of Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Annie T., widow of Freeman Morgan, of 
Chicago; Mary T., widow of Charles A. Holm, of Hammond. Indiana: A. 
IMurrav: and Austria T.. wife of Charles A. Ross, of Austin, Illinois. 

Mr. A. Murray Turner was reared in Lake county, and received his 
education in the Crown Point schools. He was engaged in farming and 
stock-raising until 1888, at which time he was elected sheriff, and sen'ed 
four years. He came to Hammond in 1893 and joined a syndicate formed 
to build the first street railway of the city. He was president of this com- 
pany until 1900. He was engaged in various other enterprises, and in 
1901 organized the First National Bank of Hammond, becoming its presi- 
dent, in which office he has effected much in making the First National one 
of the soundest and most reliable financial institutions of the county. Mr. 
Turner is a stanch Republican, and was a delegate to the national conven- 
tion that nominated McKinley for president in 1900. 

December 31, 1890, Mr. Turner married Miss E. Lillian Blackstone. 
Thev enjoyed a most happy marital union for ten years, during which one 
daughter was born, Margaret Caroline Turner. ]\Irs. Turner passed away 
in November, 1900, at the age of thirty years. She was a member of the 
Presbyterian church, and a woman of many social graces and accomplish- 
ments, tboroughlv devoted to her home interests antl thoughtful and careful 
of her husband's best interests. 

She was a daughter of Dr. John K. and Margaret J. (Bryant) Black- 
stone, of Heljron, Indiana. Her paternal grandfather was also a physician, 
and her maternal grandfather, Simeon Bryant, was a native of Ohio and 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 343 

a farmer. She had three brothers and was the only daughter. Her mother 
was a native of Hebron, and lier father of Athens, Ohio. Her father was 
a soldier in the Mexican war, being the youngest commissioned officer in 
that conflict, and in the Ci\il war he served as surgeon with the rank- of major. 

WILLIAM J. McALEER. 

William J. McAleer, a prominent lawyer of Hammond and prosecuting 
attorney of the thirty-first judicial circuit of the state of Indiana, has had 
seven years of creditable and successful practice at the law, all in Hammond, 
and his popularity in the city and county is shown by his election and re- 
election to the important administrative office which he now holds. He 
was a teacher a number of years, and also followed other occupations before 
taking up the law, and all in all he has had a career of which he may well 
be proud. 

Mr. McAleer was born in Gray county, Ontario, Canada, July 31, 1867, 
a son of John and Frances (Burchill) McAleer, both natives of Canada. 
His mother was one of the fourteen children born to Jason Burchill, a 
native of Ireland and a Methodist preacher, who emigrated to Canada about 
1840, and died there when eighty-four years of age; his wife was Isabell 
Brown, and she li\-ed to be eighty-three years old. The father of John McAleer 
was William McAleer, who was born in Ireland and emigrated thence to Can- 
ada, where he spent the remainder of his long life of ninety-seven years, being a 
farmer by occupation. His wife, Nancy (Brown) McAleer. attained the ad- 
vanced age of eighty-six years. 

John McAleer, the father of William J. McAleer, was a Canadian 
farmer all his life. He lieM the office of reeve for many years, and also other 
minor offices. He died in 1901, at the age of sixty-two years. His wife 
survives him, and is now sixty-three years old. They were both Methodists. 
Thev were the parents of five children : Edith, the wife of R. T. McGirr, of 
Maford, Canada; William J.; Martha, the wife of David Berridge of Tlies- 
salon. Algoma, Canada: Annie, the wife of Thomas Brooks, of Thessalon; 
and Robert, of Thessalon. 

Mr. William J. McAleer was reared on a farm in Canada, and after 
a course in the district schools graduated from the Owen Sound Business 
College, in 1886. He then came over into the L^nited States, and for six 



344 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

years was engaged in teaching in Sault Ste. Marie. Michigan. From there 
he went west to the state of Washington, and was employed by the govern- 
ment in the Indian service for two years at Granville, Chehalis county. He 
resigned his position and came to Valparaiso. Indiana, and entered the col- 
lege there. In 1897 he graduated with the degrees of B. S. and LL. B., and 
in the same year was admitted to the bar and commenced the practice of 
law at Hammond. In November, 1900. he was elected to the office of 
prosecuting attorney, leading the Republican ticket in that election, as he 
also did in the election of 1902. He is one of the professors in the law de- 
partment of the Valparaiso Normal College. 

Mr. McAleer has been in the Republican ranks ever since attaining man- 
hood, and is an interested political worker. He affiliates with Garfield Lodge 
No. 569, F. &. A. M.. and also with the Benevolent and Protective Order of 
Elks. His residence is at 368 State street. He was married May 21, 1892. 
to Miss Ethelia Hembroff, a daughter of Joseph and Harriet (Grady) Hemb- 
roff. They have two children, Leoda and Verna. 

JOHN HIGGINS, M. D. 

Dr. John Higgins, who for some time before his death, on April 7, 
1904. li\ed as a retired physician, was one of the early settlers of Crown 
Point, and in community afifairs was prominent and influential, so that his 
life record forms an important chapter in the history of the city in \v-hich he 
made his home. He was born in Perry, Wyoming county. New York, May 
28, 1822. Ebenezer Higgins, his grand fatlier. was born in Connecticut, the 
familv having continuously remained in that portion of the country. David 
Higgins, the father, was also born in Connecticut and became a civil en- 
gineer. He married Miss Eunice Sackett, a native of Vermont, and bis death 
occurred in New York. In their family were ten children, of whom Dr. 
Higgins was the seventh in order of liirth He was only about four years 
old when his parents remo^•ed from Wyoming county to Osborn. New York, 
where he remained until fourteen years of age. The family home was then 
established at Seneca Falls, where he remained until sixteen years old. when he 
came with his mother to the west, arriving at Chicago, Illinois, on the 2d of 
July, 1838. After a brief period passed in that city he removed to Vermilion 
county, Illinois, where the following winter he was engaged in reaching 




cJir^^^^ 



/ / 




HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 345 

school He afterward worked on a farm tlirough the summer months and 
in the winter seasons continued teaching until 1843, when he took up the 
study of medicine. In the winter of 1843-44 he came to Lake county, In- 
diana, and in May of the latter year established his home at Crown Point, 
where he began studying medicine \\ith Dr. \\\ C. Farrington, who directed 
his reading for about two years. 

In the year 1850 he went to California, crossing the plains to Sacra- 
mento, and spent a year in the mountains. On the expiration of that 
period he returned to Frankfort, Illinois, and in February, 1859, he estab- 
lished his home at Crown Point, Indiana. There he continued in practice 
until 1861, when he was appointed surgeon of the Twelfth Illinois Cavalry, 
but was employed mainly as a brigade surgeon and in general hospitals in 
Chicago and \\'ashington, where he remained tor three years and four months, 
rendering active and efficient aid to the wounded soldiers. He made a most 
creditable record as an army surgeon, his aid being of great value to those 
who needed professional services. 

In 1865 Dr. Higgins returned to Crown Point and located where he now 
lives. He was in active and continuous practice until 1900, and he had a 
large patronage, his efforts being very effective in alleviating human suffer- 
ing. He kept in touch with modern progress in the line of his profession 
and through broad study maintained a foremost position among the repre- 
sentatives of his calling. He was examiner for different life insurance com- 
panies, and in the earl}' days of his practice he rode for long distances across 
the country, even traveling from twenty-five to forty miles to attend a 
patient, his practice extending into Porter county, Indiana, and into Illinois. 

In 1847 Dr. Higgins was united in marriage to Miss Diantha Tremper, 
who was born in Lewiston county. New York, and died in 1898. They 
had one daughter, Eunice A., who is now the widow of Julius \V. Youche. 
Dr. Higgins was a Mason for many years and in early life was a Whig, 
casting his ballot for William Henry Harrison, although he had not then 
attained the age of twenty-one years. He continued to affiliate with the 
Whig party until the organization of the Republican party, after wh.ich time 
he was one of its stalwart advocates. He was at the time of his death the 
only sun-iving member of his father's family of ten children, one of whom 
died when forty-four years of age, three between the age of sixty and seventy, 



3'i6 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

two between seventy and eighty and two lietween tlie asres of eiehty and 
ninety. In his practice he was connected with tlie hnhana Medical Society, 
and was at one time a delegate to the .\nierican Medical Association. He 
long maintained .h creditable position as a leading representatiye of the 
medical fraternity of northwestern Indiana, and his prominence in his pro- 
fession was well dcseryed and his .succcess was justly merited. He was 
yery widely kunwn throughout this portion of the state because of his active 
connection with the profession, which is of the greatest possible value to 
humanity, and was ever accounted one of its foremost members on account 
of his skill and also because of his fidelity to the ethic? of the profession. 

DAVID D. GRIFFITH. 

David D. Criffilh is filling the position of city treasurer of \\"hiting, 
and is one in whom iiis fellow townsmen have had confidence because his 
ability and fidelity have been tested in business and social life. He was born 
in South Wales on the 20th of March, 1844, and is a son of David and Ann 
(Jenkins) Griffith. The days of his childhood and youth were passed in 
his native country and his education was acquired in the schools there. He 
came to .\merica m 1870, when about twenty-six years of age, attracted to 
the new world by the hope that he might find improved business conditions 
and greater opportunities here. He located first in Hubbard, Ohio, but 
soon removed to Pennsylvania, establishing his home in Oak Hill, that 
state, where he remained for about three years. On the expiration of that 
period he removed to Churchill, Ohio, near Youngstown, and subsequently 
he resided at New Straitsville, Ohio. On leaving there he came to Whiting, 
Indiana, in 1895. and entered the employ of the Standard Oil Company, with 
which he was connected continuously for eight years or until 1903, when, 
following the incorporation of Whiting as a city, he was elected the first city 
treasurer and is now acting in that capacity. He was chosen to this position 
on the Republican ticket and since coming to America he has been a stanch 
advocate of Republican principles. He keeps well informed on the questions 
and issues of the day and warmly espouses the party by which he was chosen 
10 office. 

In 1865 Mr. Giitfith was united in marriage to Miss Annie Owens, a 
native of South Wales, and they are now the parents of six living children, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 347 

three soit? and three daugliters, namely : William, Sarah. Thomas. Gomer, 
Margaret and .Amelia. They also lost one son. David, who was killed by an 
explosion in a mine in British Columbia, and was under ground for five 
months before discovered. 

Mr. Griffith is quite well known in fraternal circles, being a member of 
tiie Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Knights of Pythias Lodge, of 
which he is now financial secretary; the Whiting Mutual Benefit Association, 
of which he is secretary, and Ivorites Lodge, a Welsh organization. He is 
a very public-spirited man and takes an active interest in all things pertain- 
ing to the w-elfare and upbuilding of his community. No citizen of Whiting 
is more thoroughly representative or more devoted to the promotion of her 
welfare than Mr. Griffith, whose name is widely known for the prominent 
part he has taken in local mterests. He has never regretted the step which 
he took when he left his native country and came to the new world, for he 
has thorough sympathy with the free institutions and the governmental policy 
of the United States and there is no more loyal American than this adopted 
son. Fie has been connected with the Baptist denomination the most of 
his days, in this and the old country. 

WILLIAM E. SMITH. 

William E. Smith, present incumbent of the office of assessor of Ross 
township, has been identified with the farming interests of Lake county and 
at present owns a farm on section i8. He has lived in this county for over 
forty years, so that he is familiar with most of its history subsequent to 
the real pioneer epoch. During all this time he has had a busy career, devoted 
mainly to agriculture, but has also found time to give to the management 
of the affairs of his community, in which he has heen esteemed and honored 
throughout his life. 

Mr. Smith was born in Erie county. Pennsylvania. June 6, 1847, ^n 
the old homestead where his father, Amos Smith, was born, and where he 
followed farming until his death in young manhood, in 1852. Mr. Smith's 
mother was Harriet (Ellis) Smith, who died in 1858, leaving four oriihaned 
children. 

Mr. Smith has a l.rother, Cyrus, who is a prominent farmer also in 
section 18 of Ross township, and whose life history is given on other pages. 



348 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. \\". E. Smitli was reared on tlie old Penns^dvania homesteafl to llie age 
of sixteen, receiving" his education in the puljh'c schools. He came to Lake 
county. Indiana, in 1863, and for a time also attended the public schools 
here. Farming has been his principal occupation since arriving at man- 
hood, and his nice farm of fifty acres is well improved and highly cultivated. 

Mr. Smith is a steadfast Republican, and takes considerable interest in 
local politics. He -was appointed to the office of assessor, holding it four 
years by appointment, and was then elected for one year, and in 1900 was 
re-elected for a full term, discharging its duties at the present time and hav- 
ing given a most painstaking and satisfactory administration for nine years. 
For se\'eral years he also held the ofifice of township supervisor. 

He was first married in 1870, to Miss Cassie Booth, who had one daugh- 
ter, Mabel, now the wife of Frank F. Peterson, a farmer of Ross township. 
Mrs. Smith died in 1874. and in 1881 Mr. Smith married Miss Caroline 
Harper, a native of Ashtabula county, Ohio. There are no children bv this 

marriage. 

D. M. VANLOON. 

D. M. Vanloon is one of the revered patriarchs of Hobart, who has 
attained the age of seventy-seven years and who for fifty-seven years has 
been a resident of this part of the state. For a long period he was identified 
with building interests, and has contributed in no small degree to the progress 
and improvement of the community. He is now living retired, and he 
enjoys in high measure the respect and good wnll of his fellow men, who 
have long been familiar with the history of his upright career. 

Mr. Vanloon was born in Bradford county, Pennsyhania, December 
18, 1827, his parents being Everett and Elizabeth S. (Miller) X'anloon, who 
were natives of Pennsylvania. He remained at home until about twenty-five 
years of age, assistnig in the work of the home farm. In the year 1846 he 
became a resident of LaPorte county, Indiana, and the following year arrived 
in Lake county, settling about three miles south of Hobart. where he devoted 
his energies to agricultural pursuits. When twenty-five years of age, how- 
ever, he began learning the carpenter's trade, which he followed for a long 
period, being closely identified with building interests in this portion of the 
state. 

In 1861 Mr. Vanloon responded to his country's call, enlisting as a 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 349 

member of Company H, Ninth Indiana Volunteer Infantry, witli which lie 
served for three months. He was then honorably discharged on account of 
disability. He was one of the first men to enlist from Lake county, but was 
unable to endure the hardships and rigors of war. He then returned to 
Hobart and again took up work at the carpenter's trade, which he followed 
continuously until 1896. In that year he retired from active business life 
and is now enjoying a well merited rest. 

In 1864 Mr. Vanloon was united in marriage to Aliss Johanna Switzer, 
and they ha\-e become the parents of four children, of whom two are now 
deceased, Elizabeth and James Justin. Those still living are Rudolph D. and 
Lawrence F. 

Mr. Vanloon holds membership with the Holjart Post No. 411, G. A. R., 
and in politics he is an earnest Republican and is now filling the ofifice of 
justice of the peace, being strictly fair and impartial in the discharge of his 
duties. A review of his life record shows that at all times he has Ijeen loyal 
to principle, faithful in the performance of every task assigned him, honor- 
able in his business relations and straightforward in all his dealings with his 
fellow men. Moreover, he is entitled to distinction as a pioneer settler of 
Lake county, having been an interested witness of its growth and develop- 
ment for fifty-seven years. Great changes have occurred in that time, and 
Mr. Vanluon has endorsed every measure which he lielieved would contribute 
to the county's progress, and in his community has aided materially in ad- 
vancing the substantial upbuilding and development of Hobart. 

JOHN L. FIESTER. 

The business interests of Hobart find a worth)- representati\-e in John 
L. Fiester, a general mercliant of the town. He has always lived in this sec- 
tion of the country, and early became imbued with the enterprising spirit 
which has been the dominant factor in producing the wonderful and sub- 
stantial development of the middle west. His birth occurred in Chicago on 
the 28th of Noveml^er, 1858, his parents being Jacob and Mary (Thering) 
Fiester, both of whom were born in Switzerland. Coming to America in 
early life ihey were married in this country. The father was employed as a 
fireman in steamboats on the Mississippi river for about ten years, and in 
1854 he went to Chicago, where he secured employment in a rolling mill. 



350 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

His last cla}s. liowever, were passed in Hobart, where he died in 1900 and 
where his widow is still living. They were the parents of thirteen children, 
six of whom yet survive, three sons and three daughters. 

John L. Fiester, the third of the living children, was reared and educated 
in the city of his nativity, where he ranained until eighteen years of age. 
when he secured employment on a farm in Lake county, Indiana, being thus 
employed for five years. He came to Hobart in 1883, and was engaged in 
the butcliering business for five years in partnership with James Roper. He 
then sold out and formed a partnership with Lewis Passow, this relation 
being maintained for two years, at the end of which time Mr. Passow died. 
Mr. Fiester then took entire charge of the business, but a year later admitted 
John Killigrew, and they were together in business for ele\-en \-ears, when 
Mr. Fiester sold out. He then turned his attention to the hardware trade, 
conducting a store for about six months, and his next venture was in the 
line of jewelry merchandising, becoming proprietor of the store which he 
now owns. He carries a well selected line of general merchandise, and by 
reason of his earnest efforts to please his patrons, his reasonable prices and 
his straightforward dealing, he has secured a patronage that is constantly 
growing and has assumed profitable proportions. 

The home life of Mr. Fiester is very pleasant. He was married June 28, 
1883. to Miss Amanda Passow, a daughter of Ernst and Mamie Passow. 
This union has been blessed with three sons : Frank, Edward and ^^^alter. 
Mr. Fiester is a member of the Independent Order of Foresters, and politic- 
ally is a Democrat. He has been a representative of Hobart's business inter- 
ests for twenty-one years, and his enterprise has contributed to the com- 
mercial activity of the town and at the same time has ujade his own career 
one of signal success, in which he has risen from a humble financial position 

to one of aiTiuence. 

\\". B. OWEN. 

W. B. Owen, superintendent o'" the National Fire Roofing Companv at 
Hobart, Indiana, is a young man whose responsible business position indi- 
cates his marked capabilit}' and enterprising spirit. He is numbered among 
Indiana's native sons, his birth having occurred in Porter countv on the 
31st of October. 1882. His father. \\'i]liam B. Owen, was born in Crown 
Point, New York, in 1835, and about 1878 became a resident of Porter 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 351 

count\". Indiana. He was a prominent Ijrick manufacturer of Porter and 
Lake counties, establishing his liome in the latter about 1886. There he 
founded a brick manufacturing plant, which he conducted until his death in 
1901. This became a leading industrial enterprise of the county and was a 
factor in the business prosperity of the communit}- in which it was located. 
jMr. Owen's father was well known in temperance circles, took an active part 
in the work of suppressing the liquor traffic and gave his political allegiance 
to the Prohibition party. He served as town trustee of Hobart for about 
twelve years and was greatly interested in the development and progress of 
the town. He was also a prominent Mason and was an active and zealous 
member of the Methodist Episcopal church, his life being in consistent 
harmony with his professions. He married Miss Annie Pride, a native of 
Glasgow. Scotland, who came to America with her parents when but six 
years old. She was a resident of Chicago for some years, and she died in 
Lake county. Indiana, in November. 1897. Mr. and Mrs. \\'illiam B. Owen, 
Sr.. were the parents of four children, three sons and a daughter : \\'i]liam 
L., who is studying medicine in Chicago; Jessie and Robert, who are de- 
ceased ; and W. B. 

W. B. Owen, the youngest of the family, pursued his early education 
m tlie iHiblic schools of Plobart and afterward attended the Chicago Manual 
Training school for three vears. He was then associated with his father in 
business, and in 1902 was made superintendent of the National Fire Roofing 
Company, which position he now holds. He has a thorough and accurate 
knowledge of the business in both principle and detail, and combined with his 
executive force and keen discernment he has been enabled to so control the 
affairs of the company as to make its interests ^'ery profitable. He now has 
in his employ one hundred and five men. and the enterprise of which he is 
the head is one of the most important productive industries of the county. 
Fifteen hundred car-loads of the products were shipped in the year 1903. 
The company also owns a large plant at Twin Bluff. Illinois, near Ottawa, of 
which Mr. Owen is superintendent, and there they do about one-half the 
amount of business transacted at Hobart. 

In 1902 yir. Owen was joined in wedlock to Miss Eva May Kitchem. 
a daughter of Albert Kitchem. The}- have one child, Jessie. Like his father, 
Mr. Owen is a most stalwart advocate of temperance principles and gives his 



35-2 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

political allegiance Lo the party which embraces his views on this question. 
He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and his has been an 
upright and honorable career. In all of his business life he has never been 
known to take advantage of the necessities of his fellow men, but places his 
dependence upon the sure and safe qualities of energy, good workmanship 
and honorable dealing — which always prove an excellent foundation upon 
whicli to rear the superstructure of prosperity. 

FRED CASTLE, M. D. 

Dr. Fred Castle, who was formerly engaged in the practice of medicine, 
enjoying a large and lucrative practice and rendering valuable assistance to 
his fellow-men, is now living retired in Lowell. He is a native of Franklin, 
Franklin county, Vermont, his natal day being August 9, 1840. His father, 
Stanley Castle, was also born there and was a farmer by occupation. He 
left New England, however, in 1847, ^"^ made his way westward to Lake 
count}^ Indiana, locating in Cedar Creek township, where he secured a tract 
of land, which he developed into a rich and productive farm. Prospering 
in his undertakings, he added to his possessions from time to time until his 
realty holdings aggregated about seven hundred acres. 

Dr. Castle is the elder of two children, and was a lad of seven, summers 
when brought by his parents to Lake county. His early education was ac- 
quired in an old log schoolhouse, such as was common in pioneer days of 
this portion of the state. He afterward attended Valparaiso College, and, 
while there pursuing his study, enlisted in response to the country's call, 
becoming a member of Company G, Twelfth Indiana Cavalry, in 1863. He 
joined the army as a private, but was made orderly sergeant and did active 
service until the close of the war, when he received an honorable discharge 
from the hospital in which be had been for six months on account of 
rheumatism. 

When the country no longer needed his services Dr. Castle returned 
to Lowell, where he remained for a year and a half, ere he had sufficiently 
recovered his health to engage in active business. At the end of that time 
he began teaching in the public schools and also taught vocal and instrumental 
music. Later he retired from the field of public-school education in order 
to devote more time and attention to music. He also took up the study of 




e^fm (^^/2^:£/^^u/ "^^^a^k^^ 




FRED CASTLE 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 353 

medicine, ami alter pursuing his reading for five years he was graduated 
from the medical department of the University of Michigan at Ann Arhor 
with the class of 1869. He practiced medicine for ten years in Minnesota., 
being located at Caledonia. Houston county. He was forced to abandon 
the practice, however, on account of rheumatism, and then returned to In- 
diana, after which he devoted his time to farming for a number of years. 
At length he divided his land among his children, but still continues the 
supervision of the property. Dr. Castle owned at one lime about three 
hundred and fifty acres, and he still has control of two hundred and 
fifty acres. 

He was married to his present wife in 1878. She bore the maiden 
name of Rachel Ellingsen, and to them have been born three children : 
Carrie M., who is now the wife of Cecil M. Johnson, who resides upon one 
of her father's farms: John; and Nellie M. 

Prior to the Civil war Dr. Castle was a Democrat, but at that time he 
joined the Republican party and has since been unfaltering in support of 
the party and its platform. He is a member of Burnham Post, G. A. R., 
and is a Royal Arch Mason. Coming to Lake county in early boyhood days, 
he has witnesed the greater part of its growth and improvement as it has 
emerged from pioneer conditions to take its place among the leading counties 
of this great commonwealth. Whatever has been accomplished here in the 
way of progress and improvement has been to him a matter of deep interest, 
and inasfar as possible he has co-operated in the work for the general good. 

WILLIAM M. FOSTER. 

William M. Foster is the efficient and popular agent of the Pittsburg, 
Fort Wayne and Cliicago Railroad at Hobart, and his relations in a business 
and personal way with this city have been most pleasant and profitable. He 
was born in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, September 16, 1861. His 
father, James Foster, was a native of Allegheny comity, Pennsylvania, and 
was of Scotch-Irish descent. He followed the occupation of farming in early 
life, and at one time was engaged in the operation of a sawmill and the manu- 
facture of lumber. At the time of his death, however, he was connected with 
the steel industry in Pittsburg, where he died in 1880. His wife and the 
mother of Mr. Foster was Charlotte Benton, also a native of the Keystone 

23 



354 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

state, where imicli of lier life has been passed, but she is now Hving in Hobart, 
Indiana, at tlie age of seventy-five years. Her parents were EngHsh born, 
and some of their children were also born in England. James and Charlotte 
Foster had five sons and two daughters : Sarah Antoinette, who died in 
December, 1897; John Benton, who is a foreman in the Edgar Thompson 
Steel Works at Braddock, Pennsyh'ania ; Henry Albert, who was engaged 
with a pulilishing company at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, and was formerly 
train dispatclier at Fort Wayne for the Pittsburg, Fort Wayne and Chicago 
Railroad; William M., -who is the fourth child and third son; Marian A., 
who died in infancy; James Alexander, who is a foreman in the machine 
shops of the Pittsburg, Fort Wayne anil Chicago Raihva)-, at Fort Wayne, 
Indiana, where he entered as an apprentice, in 1886, and has occupied posi- 
tions in several other machine shops since then, returning to the Pennsyh'ania 
Company's shops in 1901, and was promoted to his present position of fore- 
man in 1903; and Richard Franklin, a telegraph operator at Liverpool, In- 
diana, with the Pennsylvania S3'stem, who was born in Westmoreland county, 
Pennsylvania, July 2S. 187 1. This son. the youngest of the family, is an 
especially proficient musician and performer on the mandolin, possessed of 
much artistic skill, besides being so capable in his serious line of work. 

j\Ir. William M. Foster was reared and educated in Pennsylvania, at- 
tending school at Pittsburg for one year. He was a traveling man for four 
years, representing different lines of business. In 1887 he took up the study 
of telegraphy at Fort Wayne in the office of the Pittsburg. Fort Wayne and 
Chicago Railroad. He had completed his term of apprenticeship in one year, 
and then served a year as extra operator. In Decemlier. 1889. he was given 
a regular position, and in 1892 was appointed relief agent. In 1895 he was 
transferred from the latter capacity to the post of station agent at Hobart, 
which position he is still filling to the entire satisfaction of his companv. 
He is a very capable man. and his courtesy in the treatment of the |iatrons 
of the road has won him high commendation and been a chief factor in his 
success. Mr. Foster is a true-blue Republican, and fraternally is affiliated 
with Camp No. 5202, M. W. A., and with the M. L. McClelland Lodge 
No. 357, of the Masonic order at Flobart. He and his wife are members 
of the Unitarian church at Hobart. 

Mr. Foster's wife, to whom lie was married on June 24, 1896, was 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 355 

I\Iiss Julia C. Butler, a daughter of William M. and Elizabeth (Johnson) 
Butler. The history of her father, a pioneer of Chicago and of Lake county, 
is detailed below. Mrs. Foster was born in Chicago, July 4, 1871, and she 
spent some of her girlhood days in Holiart. She received her education in 
the grammar schools and in the Hobart high school, antl she completed her 
education in the Valparaiso Normal College. Her own educational qualifica- 
tions led her into teaching, and before her marriage she was known as one 
of the successful teachers in the public schools of Hobart and Liverpool. 
Her interests are still afforded as far as possible to literary affairs, and she 
is a member of the \Voman"s Reading Club of Hobart. She is among the 
most highly esteemed ladies of Hobart, and her social relations are with the 
best people of the city. Mr. and Mrs. Foster have two children : The son, 
James Moulton. was born July 8, 1897, and Helen Virginia was born 
April 30, 1900. 

Shortly after their marriage Mr. Foster purchased a comfortable and 
commodious modern residence on Cleveland avenue in Hobart, really ex- 
changing for it his residence property in Fort Wayne. ]\Ir. Foster takes 
great pride in his nice home, and gives attention to the adornment of the 
nice grounds about the house, while Mrs. Foster does her part so well fcjr 
interior comfort and beauty. 

There follows the obituary of Mrs. Foster's father, as clipped from an 
issue of the local press dated in December, 1895. 

Died, December i, ^\'illiam M. Butler, Sr., one of Hobart's oldest 
residents. He was a native of Watertown, New York, where he was born 
Jannarv 22. 1824. He came to Chicago in 1837, and was one of the far- 
sighted pioneers who watched the frontier trading post de\'elop, like the 
fairy castles of a single night, mto the representative commercial metropolis 
of a continent. Mr. Butler was engaged in the hardware business there 
until the great fire. He then mo\-ed to Hobart, where he has ever since 
resided. He lea\-es a wife and ten children, an interesting fa'nily, to whom 
the sincere sympathy of this community is extended in their bereavement. 
The funeral services were held Wednesday forenoon from the home. 

"We see but dimly through the mists and vapors." — And perhaps most 
dimly on this earth can we penetrate the \'eil which co\ers the inmost heart 
and impulses of our fello^^• men. We see the puppets play upon the boards ; 



356 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

1)iit of the hand beliind the curtain which controls and impels them, we know- 
nothing. 

Mr. Butler's was a unique character— rugged, and strong of purpose 
and will. All-sufficient unto himself, he possessed his hopes and his ambi- 
tions, and he fought and struggled for them with a silent determination 
which was only the stronger because its ordinary indications were repressed. 
He b.ac! many acquaintances, yet the number of men who really knew him 
was very few. Those who were permitted to see beneath the stern and 
rugged exterior found something, within the inner self of the man, to under- 
stand and look upon with no little admiration. He had had his troubles 
and his disappointments : and out of them he had brought one strong desire 
to provide for the children whose happiness and worldly welfare was. as a 
matter of fact, his highest wish. Taciturn he was. and not given to revealing 
his inner emotions to those about him. And yet he had moments when lie 
unbent, when his grim silence seemed to relax ; and in those moments, \\hich 
were seldom seen by any except his family, there could be read the better 
nature which dominated his life's hard and really unselfish struggle. 

He possessed in an exceptional degree the refined education and deep 
mental grasp which might have made him a highly known student and thinker 
had he chosen. His ideal of life was a plain and far from idyllic one. He 
was faithful to his religious tenets to the end, and in accordance with a 
prevouslv expressed desire, the funeral address was made by the eloquent 
Cora L. V. Richmond, of Chicago, one of the most brilliant leaders of the 
Spiritualistic exponents in America. Appropriate music was pleasingly ren- 
dered by the quartette choir of the Unitarian church. 

AUGUST CONRAD. 

Perhaps no one business enterprise or industry indicates more clearly 
the commercial and social status of a town than its hotels. The wide-awake, 
enterprising villages and cities must have pleasant accommodations for vis- 
itors and traveling men, and the foreign public judges of a community by the 
entertainment afforded to the strangers. In this regard the Conrad Hotel. 
of which Mr. Conrad is proprietor, is an index of the character and advan- 
tages of Tolleston, for the hostelrv will rank favorablv with those of manv a 
larger place, and its genial proprietor neglects nothing that can add to the 
comfort of his guests. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 357 

Mr. Conratl is a native of Germany, his birth having occurred in tlie 
fatherland on the 9th of September. 1841. He was tliere reared, his boyhood 
days being quietly passed, and the pubHc schools of Germany afforded him 
his educational privileges. After putting aside his text-books he began 
preparation for life's practical duties by serving an ajiprenticeship to the 
cabinet-maker's trade. He began when fourteen years of age and worked on 
that way until twenty years of age, when, in accordance with the laws of the 
fatherland demanding military service from every able-bodied son. he joined, 
the German army and served for three years. 

Desirous of benefiting- his financial condition Mr. Conrad resolved to 
come to America, having heard much of its superior fiusiness opportunities 
and possibilities. Accordingly he bade adieu to home and friends and in 
1866 sailed for the new world, landing eventually at New York. He did 
not tarry in the eastern metropolis, however, liut made his way at once into 
the interior of the country, locating in Chicago, where he followed his trade 
as an employe until 1870. In that year he removed to Clarke Station, where 
he entered the emplo}' of the Washington Ice Company, but later returned 
to Chicago, although he still remained in the service of the \\'ashington Ice 
Company. In 1879 he came to Tolleston, where he embarkctl in the hotel 
business, in which he has continued to the present time, co\"ering a period 
of twenty-five consecutive years. As hotel proprietor he is well known, 
being a genial landlord, and has made it his study to understand the needs 
and wishes of his guests and to meet these inasfar as is possible. He has 
obtained a good patronage and has made the Conrad Hotel a credit to the 
town. 

In 1870 was celeljrated the marriage of August Conrad and Miss 
Harmena Ratzlow, who died in 1S98 leaving four children, namely: Otto. 
Emma, Minnie and Paul, all of whom are yet under the parental roof. 

^Ir. Conrad has been quite active and influential in public affairs in his 
community and is a recognized leader of public thought and action in Tolles- 
ton, where his worth and .ability have been recognized by election to public 
office. In 1892 he was chosen by popular suffrage to the position of town- 
ship trustee, in which capacity he served in a most acceptable manner for 
four years. He then was appointed to fill the vacancy caused by the death 
of Henry Seegers in the office of trustee. He was also supervisor for two 



358 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

terms, or four years. Mr. Conrad cast liis first presidential vote for General 
Grant, but since that time has been a Democrat and is a stanch advocate 
of the ])arty, bielieving that its platform contains the best elements of good 
government. Air. Conrad is well known in his part of the county and has 
been identified with its upbuilding aufl progress through a quarter of a 
century. In every ofiice that he has been called upon to fill he has discharged 
his duties with promptness and fidelity so that over the record of his public 
career as well as his private life there falls no shadow of wrong or suspicion 
of evil. He came to America empty-handed, but the strong and salient 
cliaracteristics of the German people have been manifested in liis career, and 
the hope that led him to come to the United States has theref'ire been more 
than realized. As time has passed he has made financial progress and has 
also gained in addition to his material success the good will and confidence 
of those with whom he has been associated. 

ALEXANDER C. THOMPSON. 

Alexander C. Thompson, formerly identified with agricultural interests 
in Hobart and now living a retired life, was born in the town of Streetsboro, 
Portage county, Ohio, on the loth of July, 1838, and is the third son in a 
family of eleven children, whose parents were John and Elizabeth (Cock- 
burn) Thompson. The father was a native of Edinburg. Scotland, and the 
mother was born in Dalkeith, Scotland. They were married in that country, 
and two of their children were born there, but the others were born in Ohio. 

Alexander C. Thompson was reared in the county of his nativity, pur- 
sued a common school education, and afterward spent one year in Hiram 
College when General James A. Garfield was a teacher there. He wgs reared 
to farm labor and continued upon the old homestead until 1861, when he left 
the plow and donned the blue uniform in defense of the stars and stripes. 
He enlisted in Company E, First Ohio Volunteer Infantry, as a private, in 
response to President Lincoln's first call for troops. He served for one year 
and then returned to Portage county, Ohio. Later he visited different states 
of the Union and finally located in Ford county, Illinois, at Paxton. There 
he was engaged in farming for four years, after which he came to Lake 
county, Indiana, in 1865. He then bought a farm in Ross township of 
partly impro\'ed land, and devoted his attention to its further cultivation and 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 350 

development until iSgy. He placed the fields in excellent condition so that 
they returned to him large crops. He made substantial improvements upon 
his land and conductetl his farm interests according to the most approved 
plans and progressive ideas. Year by year his financial resources were in- 
creased through the sale of his harvests, and in 1897, with a \-ery desirable 
competence, he retired from business life and took up his abode in Hobart. 

In 1862 Mr. Th.ompson was united in marriage to Miss Mary J. Wat- 
son, a native of Lorain county, Ohio, and a daughter of John and Elizabeth 
Watson. This marriage has been blessed with three children: Frederick, 
William and Hugh. The family is widely and favorably known in Hobart. 
and their circle of friends is extensive. ]\Ir. "Thompson has figured quite 
prominentl}' in public affairs, and his worth and ability have lieen recognized 
by his fellow citizens, who have frequently called upon him to serve in public 
office. He was county assessor for two years, previously he was assessor of 
Ross township for eighteen years, and in all matters of citizenship has been 
progressive and helpful. His political allegiance is given the Democracy, 
and he is a Mason, lielonging to the Hobart Lodge. He has a pleasant home 
in Hobart ami other property there, and in addition he owns his valuable 
farm of two hundred acres in Ross township, which he now rents. He has 
one of the old deeds executed bv President Fillmore, which is a rare docu- 
ment. 

JOHN HILLMAN. 

In the field of political and commercial life in Hobart John Hillman 
is well known and is nunil)ered among the leading and influential citizens of 
the town. A young man. he possesses the enterprising spirit of the west, 
which has been the dominant factor in producing the wonderful development 
of this section of the country. He is the chief executive officer of Hobart 
and is giving to the town a progressive and business-like administration. 

Mr. Hillman was born in Elgin, Illinois, on the 7th of May, 1870, and 
is a son of Frederick and Hannah (Moss) Hillman, both of whom were 
natives of Germanv, where they spent their childhood days and were mar- 
ried. John Hillman is their youngest son. His mother was twice married 
and has one daughter and two sons by her last marriage. 

In his early boyhood Mr. Hillman was brought to Lake county and was 
reared upon the home farm in Hobart township, pursuing his education in the 



3(!0 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

common schools. He remained with his step-father nnti! he started out in 
life on his own account, and then engaged in the saloon business, which he 
conducted continuously since 1889. He is also a stockholder and director in 
the First State Bank of Hobart, and is thus connected with financial in- 
terests in his part of the county. He has also taken an active part in public 
affairs, and, is now serving for the third year as a member of the town board 
and at this writing is president of that body. In fact, he has continued as its 
chief executive officer throughout his connection therewith, and his efforts 
in behalf of Hobart have been practical, effective and far-reaching. He is 
chairman of the township central committee of the Republican party, and 
does all in his power to secute Republican successes. Fraternally he is con- 
nected with the Independent Order of Foresters of America. September 27, 
1889, Mr. Hillman was united in marriage to Miss ]Mary Neiman, and to 
them has been born a son, Fred. They have many warm friends in Hobart 
and throughout the surrounding district, and their own home is noted for 

its gracious hospitality. 

JAMES BRANNON. 

James Brannon, now deceased, was a well-known and highly respected 
citizen of Lake county, and his life record should form a place in the history 
of this section of the state. He was born in Boston, Summit county, Ohio, 
July 3T, 18 19, and was a son of William Brannon, a native of Pennsylvania 
and of Irish descent. The father died in Boston, Summit county, Ohio, 
when his son James was but nine years of age. The boy afterward lived 
with an uncle until sixteen years of age, when he started out in life on his 
own account. He worked by the month for two years and never lost a day 
during that time. A\nien living in Ohio he belonged to an independent mili- 
tary company and took part in the drills which were common at that time. 
Although he earned but eight dollars per month at farm labor, he managed 
to save most of the amount, and with the money which he had acquired he 
came to Indiana in 1843, establishing bis home in Lake county. Here he 
preempted a tract of land, first owning a farm of eighty acres, to \\hich he 
afterward added forty acres. Later he sold that property and bought a 
soldier's land warrant, wherewith he secured one hundred and sixty acres of 
land in West Creek township, becoming owner of this property in 1850. 
As a farmer he was energetic, practical and progressive. He worked hard 



c* 




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Mb^ (^^Cx..^ /^fz^i^.,.!.^*^^-^ 





-es^^^^/x^ 7 i A^iyn/]rurv\^^_^^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 361 

year after year, and as his financial resources increased he extended the 
boundaries of his farm by additional purchases until at the time of his death 
in 1898 he was the owner of seven hundred and fifty acres of very valuable 
land, which had been accumulated through his own industry, perseverance 
and capable management. 

Mr. Brannon was ^ery well known in the county as an honored pioneer 
settler and enterprising agricultiu'ist, and as a citizen he favored public 
progress and improvement along material, social, intellectual and moral lines. 
He served as a trustee of West Creek township for twenty years, and was a 
life-long Republican, heartily endorsing the principles of the party. He 
held membership in the Presbyterian church, in which he ser\'ed as an elder 
for a number of years and he was very liberal in his contributions to the 
cause of Christianity. His life was at all times actuated by honorable and 
manly principles. 

Mr. Brannon was united in marriage to Miss Eleanor Foster, on the 
17th of May, 1851. She was born in Bradford county, Pennsylvania, March 
25, 1832, and was a daughter of Elijah D. and Jemima (Nichols) Foster. 
Her father was born in Brookfield, Massachusetts, and came to Lake county 
in 1843, locating on a tract of land in West Creek township, where he en- 
gaged in general farming" throughout his business career. He passed away 
at the advanced age of eighty-three years and his wife lived to be fifty-six 
years of age. Both parents of Mrs. Brannon had been married before, and 
the father had two sons by his former marriage, who were early settlers of 
T>ake county, A. D. Foster coming to Indiana in 1837, while George S. 
Foster arrived in 1838. There were but two white families in this part of the 
county at that time. The mother of Mrs. James Brannon was Jemima 
Nichols, and she was born near Chelsea, Orange county, Vermont, February 
7, 1792. She married first Amos Loveland. He was a soldier in the 
Revolutionary war, entering the ranks at the age of fourteen. He was pres- 
ent at the execution of Major Andre. His occupation was that of an agri- 
culturist. He was a Democrat in his political afiiliations. The grandfather 
Nichols was also a si)ldier in the Re\T)lutionary war. Mrs. Brannon's grand- 
mother was a niece nf the celebrated Cotton Mather of historic fame. The 
parents of Mrs. Brannon had ten children, and she was Iiut eleven years of 
age at the time of the remo'val of the familv to this state. .She has since 



3«2 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

lived in Lake county, making her home here from a time in \\hich there 
were no frame houses in the county, all the dwellings being built of logs. 
She has. therefore, witnessed the greater part of the growth and develop- 
ment of this portion of the state and can relate many interesting incidents 
concerning pioneer life and experience here. To 'Sir. and Airs. Brannon 
were liorn five children: Lucina, the wife of AI. E. Belshaw : Julia, the de- 
ceased wife of T. A. ^^'ason: Perry, who lives in Xorth Dakota: George D., 
who is a practicing physician at Crown Point : and Melvin. \\ ho has charge 
of the Biology Department in the State L'niversity at Grand Forks. North 
Dakota. 

Airs. Brannon is the owner of a valuable farm of one hundred and 
seventy-one acres, which she rents. She holds membership in the Presby- 
terian church at Lowell and is well known throughout the county, being a 
representative of one of the honored pioneer families. 

HON. THADDEUS S. FANCHER. 

Hon. Thaddeus S. Fancher has been an attorney at Crown Point. In- 
diana, for over thirty years, and has been interested in the draining and im- 
provement of the swamp land of southern Lake county. He has depended 
on his own efforts for the advancement made in his profession, ha\ing de- 
frayed his early expenses for education by teaching school. He has had a 
very successful career, both from his individual standpoint and for the gen- 
eral welfare, and his services to the county and state as a legislator and 
promoter of public improvements indicate his worth as a citizen. 

His grandfather, Thaddeus S. Fancher. was of French descent, a native 
of Connecticut, and was a pioneer to Huron county. Ohio, where his son, 
T. S. Fancher, was born in 1809. The latter lived all his life on one farm 
in Greenwich township. Huron county, and was a prosperous farmer, living 
to be eighty-four years old. He was a member of the Aletbodist church. 
He married Amy Chapman, who was born and reared in Richland county, 
Ohio, and is now living in Huron county at the age of eighty-seven. Her 
father. Cyrus Chapman, was of Scotch descent and a pioneer of Richland 
county. These parents had ten children, eight sons and two daughters, and 
five are living at present. 

Hon. Thaddeus S. Fancher, who is the seventh child and fourth son. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 363 

was born in Huron county, Ohio, August 31, 1848. and was reared there. 
His schooling was received in tlie faniihar little red schoolhouse, which was 
situated a mile from his home, and which contained the primitive equip- 
ment of the temples of learning of that day, such as hard slab seats, board 
writing desk, etc. After leaving the district school Mr. Fancher began at- 
tending Oberlin College, teaching school during the winter to pay expenses. 
He came to Crown Point in 1868, and for the following two years read law 
with Major Griffin and taught school. In 1870 he went to the Michigan 
State Uni\-ersity at .\nn Arbor, and in 1871 graduated in the law depart- 
ment. He had been admitted to the bar in Crown Point in 1870, and im- 
mediately on his return from Ann Arbor took up practice. He lost no time 
in gaining a client or patronage of some kind, for eighty cents was the entire 
capital to tide him over the initiatory stages of practice. In the same year 
he was married and settled down to the career of usefulness which has 
been continued to the present. In 1873 he was elected county superintendent 
of schools for a term of two years, and was re-elected, but served only a short 
part of this term, resigning to lake up practice. He was prosecuting attorney 
of the county for four years, and in 1879 ^^''S elected to the state legislature 
by the Republican party. In 1881 he was returned to his seat by the largest 
majority ever given any candidate in the county up to that time. He was 
eighty-one days in the first session and one hundred and one in the second, 
two of the longest sessions on record. The state statutes were revised at the 
time, and he was one of the revision committee. Since 1881 he has been con- 
tinuously engaged in practice and also in dealing in land. 

Mr. Fancher owns a large tract of land in Lake county, and for the 
past fifteen years has made a specialty of constructing ditches and draining 
marsh land. He has had the legal business invoI\-ed in the construction of 
over one hundred and fifty miles of ditching, authorized under the law of 
1881 passed while he was a member of the legislature, and which has cost 
the landowners up to this time two hundred thousand dollars, and has re- 
sulted in untold benefit to the citizens of Lake county. This land in the Calu- 
met district was formerly worth comparati\eIy nothing, but now sells for 
sixty, seventy and eighty dollars per acre. The first ditch uhich he con- 
structed in the Kankakee marsh in 1885 is known as the Singleton ditch, and 
is seventeen miles long and cost se\'enteen thousand dollars. 



364 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Fanclier married, in 1871. Miss Ardelle W'ashloorn. a daughter of 

Charles A. and Marietta (Griffin) W'asliborn. Tliey have one son. Thad- 

deus ]Milton Fanclier. who is attending- the schools of Crown Point. Mr. 

Fancher is a memher of the Masonic order and the Independent Order of 

Odd Fellows. 

CHARLES E. NICHOLS. 

Charles E. Nichols, a representative of the business life of Lowell, is 
engaged in dealing in hay. grain and seeds. He has lived in Lake county 
throughout his entire life, his birth ha\-ing occurred in \\'est Creek township, 
on the 14th of December, 1861. His grandfather. William Nichols, was 
born in New York and was of French and English descent. His father. 
H. R. Nichols, was born in Madison county, New York, and came to Lake 
county in 1836, casting in his lot among the pioneer settlers of this portion 
of the state. He first located in Crown Point, afterward lived in Cedar 
Creek township, and subsequently in \\'est Creek township. Lake county ; 
he entered land from the government and developed the wild tract into richlv 
cultivated fields, continuing his active connection with farming interests 
throughout the period of his business career. He lived to be seventy-nine 
years of age and spent sixty-two years of that time in Lake county. His 
early political allegiance was given to the Whig party, and upon its dissolu- 
tion he joined the ranks of the new Republican party, with which he con- 
tinued to affiliate until his death. He was well known in this portion of 
Indiana, and as a pioneer settler he aided in laying broad and deep the 
foundation for the present development and progress of the state. The 
mother of our subject bore the maiden name of Phoebe Eliza Kenyon. and 
was a native of Rhode Island, whence she was brought to Lake county, 
Indiana, in 1838, when but twelve years of age. Her father. John C. Kenyon, 
was one of the earliest settlers of Lake county and made his home at Pleasant 
Grove from the time of his arrival in this state until his death, which occurred 
in 1888. Mrs. Nichols still survives her husband, and now resides in Lowell 
in her seventy-eighth year. She has been a resident of Lake county for sixty- 
five years, and has, therefore, been a witness of the greater part of its 
growth, development and upbuilding. She can relate many interesting inci- 
dents of pioneer days and is familiar with its history from the period of 
early ^ettlement here down to the present time. To ]\Ir. and Mrs. H. R. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 365 

Nicliols were Ijorn six children, three sons and three daughters, all of \vlu)m 
were natives of Lake county, while tive are still living, namely: William C, 
a resident of Lowell ; Irving, who died at the age of thirty-one years ; 
Hannah N., the wife of JMortimer Gragg, of Topeka, Kansas; Ella JM., the 
wife of Cyrus Dickenson, of Lowell : and Alma, the wife of Edson Foster, 
of Chicago Heights, Illinois. 

Charles E. Nichols, the youngest member of the family, was but six 
years of age when his parents removed from the farm to L(3well and there 
he began his education in the public schools. No event of special importance 
occurred to vary the routine of life for him in his boyhood. When nineteen 
years of age he entered business life as a dealer in hay and grain, being asso- 
ciated with his father and brother from 1880 until 1886. In the latter year 
he went to Chicago, where he was engaged in the same line of business for 
about seven months, and from 1887 until i8go he was a grain dealer of 
Crown Point. He again went to Chicago, in 1890, where he remained 
for about a year and while there was a member of the board of trade. In 
1891 he returned to Lowell, since which time he has engaged in dealing in 
hay, grain and seeds at this place. He makes large purchases and sales, and 
his well conducted business interests have brought to him very gratifying 
success. He has now a very large patronage, and his annual sales reach 
an extensive figure. He is a stockholder and director in the Lowell National 
Bank and is well known in business circles as one whose success is the 
legitimate outcome of his energ\\ determination and honorable dealing. 

In 1888 Mr. Nichols was united in marriage to Miss Edna May Smith, 
a daughter of T. M. Smith, of Hammond, Indiana, and they have one child, 
Stella. Mr. Nichols belongs to Colfax Lodge No. 378, F. & A. M.. and to 
Lowell Lodge No. 300, K. of P. In politics he has ever been a stanch 
Republican, has served as a member of the school board, and takes an active 
interest in the cause of education and in everything pertaining to the welfare 
and upbuilding of his native county. With the exception of the brief inter- 
vals passed in Chicago, he has always resided within the borders of Lake 
county, and his life record is therefore well known to his fellow-citizens here. 
while the fact that many of his stanchest friends are numliered among those 
with whom he has been acquainted from boyhood is indicative of the fact 
that his career has ever been such as to command respect and confidence. 



3(56 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

In July, 1904. Mr. Nichols was appointed by the President of the National 
Hay Association, chairman of the Arbitration National Committee. At the 
ronvention at St. Louis, Missouri, Mr. Nichols attended and it was subse- 
(juently that he was appointed to this responsible position. 

HORATIO R. NICHOLS. 

Horatio R. Nichols was born in Fenner, Madison county. New York, 
January 25, 181S, and died in Lowell, April 13, 1897, leaving to mourn him 
a devoted wife, five children, four sisters and one brother, one son, three 
sisters, and one brother having preceded him to the Spirit Land. His age 
at the time of death was seventy-nine years, two months and seventeen davs. 

Mr. Nichols worked upon his father's farm, following the usual routine 
of a farmer boy's life: that is, laboring on the farm during the summer, 
attending the district school in winter, until he had reached his eighteenth 
year. At this time a tide of emigration set in towards the great and grow- 
ing west. .\ strong desire took possession of Mr. Nichols to see the western 
country, and, although }-et in his feens, he, in company with his brother, 
bade adieu to the old homestead and set upon their journey townrds the 
setting sun. They reached LaPorte, Indiana, June 2. 1836. Plere he sought 
and obtained work on a farm, where he remained until December following, 
when he again started west, arriving in this county the same month. Liking 
the appearance of this part of the country he concluded to settle here. .\ 
man by the name of Nolan who preceded Mr. Nichols about two years to 
this county, lived in a little cal;in near where the lirickyard of H. J. Nichols 
was. which is unw Washington street on the west side. The Nichols brothers 
])u.rchased Nolan's claim, which then included a large share of the site of 
Lowell, for which they paid two liundred and fifty dollars. Mr. Nolan moved 
farther west. In the following May Mr. Nichols moved onto his claim, 
where he and his brother continued to !i\e alone for several years. Tb.ey 
were known by tlie neighbors as "the nld Ijachelors." After iKuing "batched 
it" for fi\-c years Mr. Nichols concluded it was not "good for man to be 
alone." So he wooed, won and wedded JMiss Phoebe E. Kenyon. January 
23, 1845. Fifty years from that date a golden wedding was given in their 
capacious west side home. Mr. Nichols was converted and united with 
the Methodist Episcopal church at the age of thirteen years and reuniteil 




JUj ^jt^RJ/fu^ 




/^/l .A^'&yt^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 367 

witl'i the church in Lowell under the ministr^• of J. F. McDaniel. His first 
vote tor president was cast for Alartin V^an Burcn in 1840. Thus you see 
he identified himself with the Democratic party, but being of philanthropic 
turn of mini! and believing that all men should be free he became a Free 
Soiler. Since 1856 he has voted with the Republican party. At the time 
Mr. Nichols settled here his nearest neighbor on the west was Robert 
Wilkinson, who li\ed wdiere Mrs. Marvin now lives. Jacob Mendinthall 
lived where Captain J. L. Manning now lives: Samuel Bryant, Duane 
Bryant and Elias Bryan lived on the Perry Jones farm, Ross Sanger farm, 
and John Nichols farm, respectively. Although Mr. Nichols was not one of 
the oldest settlers here he lived to see this part of the country reclaimed and 
made to blossom and bloom as the rose. 

Funeral services, which were attended by a large concourse of sorrow- 
ing friends, were held at the Methodist Episcopal church, the Rev. J. B. 
Sites, assisted by Rev. E. P. Bennett, ofificiating, after which the mortal 
remains of the beloved man were interred in the Lowell cemeter\', there to 
rest until the great judgment day comes. 

WILLL\M SCHARBACH, SR. 

Numliered among the leading business men of Hobart is William Schar- 
bach. a dealer in lumber and building materials. He is a nati\e son of Ger- 
many, and in his career has manifested many of the strong and sterling traits 
of the people of the fatherland. His birth occurred in Sophienhofi' bei- 
Demmin. Stettin, October 15, 1843, l''S parents being William and Marv 
(Stoll) Scharbach, both of whom are now deceased. His father came to the 
United States in 1867, locating in Chicago. 

In taking up the personal history of William Scharbach we present to 
our readers the life record of one who is widel)- and favorably known in 
Hobart and Lake county. His education was acquired in Germany, and he 
remained there until after he had attained his majority. He was but twentv- 
four years of age, when in 1867 he bade adieu to friends and native land and 
sailed for the United States, hoping that he might find better business oppor- 
tunities in the new world. He did not tarry long on the Atlantic coast, but 
made his way at once into the interior of the country, locating in Chicago, 
where he was engaged in the lumber business. He came to Hobart in 1893 



368 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

and established the lumber yard whicii he is now conducting. He deals in 
all kinds of lumber and building materials, and has tleveloped an enterprise 
which has reached extensive and profitable proportions. Ernestly desiring 
to please his patrons, he has through his obliging manner, honorable dealing 
and reasonable prices won a large share of the public trade. He also con- 
ducts a planing mill in connection with the lumber trade. 

In 1868 Mr. Scharbach was united in marriage to Miss Minnie Hagen, 
who was born in Germany and came to America in 1867. They have five 
children : Frank, William, Emil, Bernhard and Frederick. 

Mr. Scharbach is recognized as a stalwart Republican and has been 
town trustee for one term, but his time and attention are chiefly devoted to 
his business interests, in which he has met with signal success. 

Frank C. Scharbach, the eldest son of William Scharbach, was born in 
Chicago, January 31, 1873, and was largely reared in that city, attending 
German schools. He was also a student in Concordia College at Milwaukee, 
Wisconsin, for three years, during which time he made a special study of 
languages. After completing his education he joined his father in the lum- 
ber business. He was twenty years of age when he came to Hobart, and 
he is now a well known factor in commercial circles. He, too, is a stanch 
Republican and is very active in the work of his party, serving as chairman 
of the township central committee. He is now precinct committeeman of the 
second precinct of Hobart township. On the jqth of September, 1895, ^''^ 
wedded Miss Mary Schumacher, a daughter of John Jeremiah Schumacher, 
and they have one daughter, Gertrude. Both Mr. Scharbach and his son 
are well known, and the business enterprise and laudable amljition of the 
young man, supplementing the sound judgment of the senior ])artner. render 
this firm a very strong one in Hobart. 

WILLIAM EDWARD BELSHAW. 

William Edward Belshaw, formerly identified with agricultural and 
horticultural interests in Lake county and now lix'ing a retired life in Lowell, 
manifested throughout his business career those sterling traits of character 
which lead to honorable and satisfactory success. He was resolute and 
energetic and these qualities were resultant factors in winning him the pros- 
perity that he now enjoys. He was born in West Creek township. Lake 





yZ'*-<i--'v>T_tf<-/ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 369 

county, September 28, 1848. His father, William Belshaw, was a native 
of England and when a young man came to America, locating at Dot)r 
Prairie, LaPorte county, Indiana, whence he came to Lake county about 
1836. Few settlements had been made within the borders of this county 
at that time. Much of the land was still in possession of the government, 
and in consequence was uncidtivated and unimproved. The streams had 
not been bridged and the forests were uncut, and it remained to such enter- 
prising and progressi\-e citizens as Mv. Belsliaw to reclaim tlie wild district 
for the purposes of ci\-ilization.. He secured a tract of land from the gov- 
ernment and developed a good farm in West Creek township, whereon he 
spent his remaining days, his life labors being ended in death when he was 
seventv-one years of age. His religious views were in harmony with the 
doctrines of what is known as the Church of God. He married Harriet 
Jones, a nati\-e of Ohio, in which state she was reared until eight years of 
age, when she came to Lake county. Indiana, with her father, Harr\- Jones, 
the family home being fstablished in ^^'est Creek township amid the condi- 
tions of frontier life. Mrs. Belshaw lived to be about sixty-eight years of 
age. By her marriage she became the mother of seven children, three sons 
and four daughters, of whom one daughter died in infancy. The others are 
all living, as follows : William Edward, of this review ; Mrs. Mary Cath- 
cart. of LaPorte, Indiana: Florence, the wife of James Chitwood, of Lowell; 
Charles, who is a resident of Oregon ; Lucy, the wife of Sherman Hayden, 
of Los Angeles, California; and John, a farmer, of Eugene, Oregon. 

W'illiam Edward Belshaw was reared under the parental roof upon the 
old homestead farm in \A'est Creek township. His education was acquired 
by attenrling the common schools for about two months in the winter season, 
and throughout the remainder of tiie year he worked upon the home farm, 
doing such service as his age and strength permitted. As the years ad,- 
vanced he gained in proficiency and he continued to assist his father until 
twenty-four years of age. 

On Christmas day of 1874 Mr. Belshaw was united in marriage to 
Miss Lucina Brannon. daug^hter of James and Eleanor (Foster) Brannon, 
who are mentioned on another page of this work. Mrs. Belshaw is their 
oldest child and was born and reared in West Creek township. Lake county. 
Mrs. Belshaw received her primary education in the district schools and 

24 



370 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Lowell high school and then she was a student in the Western Female Sem- 
inary at Oxford, Ohio, for two years. She was a successful teacher in her 
native county for six years. Religiously she is a member of the Presbyterian 
church, and was also a teacher in the Sunday schools. 

She is the mother of six children, three sons and three daughters, and 
five are living, as follows : J. W. Belshaw is a scccessful attorney-at-law in 
Lov/ell; he graduated in the class of 1892 in the Lowell high school and 
afterwards was a student in the Normal at Valparaiso. He was a teacher 
one year in the Lowell high school and a number of years in his native 
county. He read law with Attorney R. C. \\'ood and upon his being ad- 
mitted to the bar began the practice of his profession at Lowell. He 
wedded Miss Maud Holshaw, in July, 1898, and one little ilaughter graces 
this union, by name Ernestine. He has an attractive residence in Lowell, 
and is one of the representative citizens of the village. Lewis D.. a resident 
of West Creek township and a farmer, wedded Miss Emma Stuppy. and has 
two daughters, Mabel and Edith. Lewis graduated from the teachers' course 
in Valparaiso Normal and taught four years in Lake county. His wife was 
also a teacher in the same county. Albert B.. also a resident of West Creek 
township and a practical farmer, wedding Miss Alatilda Hadders. Julia, 
at home with her parents, was educated in Lowell high school, but her 
chosen profession is music. She was educated in music at Steinway Hall at 
Chicago, and is a successful teacher in west Lake county. She is a member 
of the Presbyterian church. Edith, the youngest, is in the fourth grade of 
the public schools. Mrs. Belshaw's progenitors were heroes in the Revolu- 
tionary war and the direct descendants are eligible to become members of 
the society of Sons and Daughters of the Revolution. Mrs. Belshaw went 
with her husband as a bride to a part of the old Belshaw homestead in West 
Creek township, and there Mr. Belshaw was engaged in general farming 
until 1895. In that year he built his present brick residence in Lowe'l, took 
up his abode thereon and is now engaged in fruit-growing. His life has 
been characterized by unfaltering industry and good management, and suc- 
cess has attended his efforts. He is now the owner of a farm of one hun- 
dred and thirty-six acres, on which his son resides. He is also a stockholder 
in the State National Bank, of Lowell, and his wife is the owner of a farm 
of one hundred and thirty acres in West Creek township, to which Mr. 
Belshaw gives his personal supervision. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 371 

yiv. Belsliaw gives his political allegiance to the Democracy and has 
been chairman of the township central committee. He takes an acti\-c interest 
in the work of the party, and his efforts in its behalf have been effective and 
far-reaching in the locality where he resides. He is at the present writing 
nominee for county treasurer on the Democratic ticket. He keeps well 
informed on the questions and issues of the day and also has a broad general 
knowledge of matters touching the general interests of society and the 
welfare of the country. Having spent his entire life in Lake county, he is 
well known to its citizens, and the fact that many of his friends are num- 
bered among those who ha\-e known him from boyhood is an indication that 
his career has been honoraI:)le, straightforward and worthy of respect. 

\\-ESLEY PATTEE. 

Wesley Pattee, of ^\■est Creek township, Ijelongs to thai better class 
of citizens whose li\'es form the truest history of an}- portion of country, 
national or local, and his genealogical and personal recon.l has many points 
of interest and worth to add to the value of this history of Lake county. 

He is a nati^•e of northwestern Indiana, having been born in the county 
of LaPorte, l\Iay 22, 1836. He was the fifth of a family of eight children, 
six sons and two daughters, whose parents were Le\vis and Susan (Mun- 
ger) Pattee, and he is the youngest of the three yet living, the other two 
being: Cyrus, married and a retired farmer of Lowell; and Sophronia, wife 
of \^olney Dickey, of Grant Park, Illinois. Two of the son.s were in the 
Civil war as members of Company B, Twentieth Indiana Infantry, and w'ere 
taken prisoners at the battle of Gettysburg and starved in the prison pens of 
Libby and Belle Isle. Mr. Pattee's father was liorn in Montreal, Canada, in 
1803, and died aged seventy-three in 1876, He lived in Canada until he was 
of age, then came to Huron county, Ohio, where be remained till after his 
marriage, and took up his abode in LaPorte county. Indiana, at the lirst 
years of that county's history. From there, after a few years' residence, he 
moved over to West Creek township in this county, and twenty years later 
became a resident of Kankakee county, Illinois, where he passed the rest 
of his life. He purchased four hundred acres of land in this latter county, 
and in his later years enjoyed very comfortable circumstances. He was a 
successful man in business affairs, was known for his decided and strong 



372 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

character, and made his influence felt wherever he lived. His ancestry was 
traced back to France, while his wife was of Scotch lineage. ' His wife, 
Susan ]Munger by maiden name, was born in Seneca county. New York, in 
1803, and she attained the great age of ninety-two years. She was a Pres- 
byterian in faitli. 

Mr. Pattee was reared in LaPorte county during the first twelve years 
of his life, and then in Lake and Kankakee counties. He is one of the men 
of the present who can look back to a log cabin school as the scene of their 
first educational experiences. The building which he recalls having attended 
in ^^'est Creek township was constructed of hewn logs and was about twelve 
by twenty feet in dimensions. He did his writing on a long Ixmrd placed 
aslant on pins driven into the wall, and he sat on a rough bench with no 
back. The teacher's place of honor was a mere stool. Light and ventilation 
came through the apertures left by the removal of two logs, filled in with 
panes of glass. He studied the elementary spelling book and Smith's arith- 
metic, while seated around the big box stove that occupied the center of 
the room. Subscription schools were the only kind known at that time, and 
twenty dollars was looked upon as a munificent salary to pay a teacher each 
month. During his own lifetime and in this very township of West Creek 
Mr. Pattee has witnessed a progression and even revolution of educational 
methods and equipment such as were not brought about in all the centuries 
before the time of his youth. And not alone in education has Mr. Pattee 
seen and been a part of progress. He and his wife well rememlier when 
not a railroad crossed the bounds of Lake county, while now fifteen lines 
network the county in every direction. He has been in Chicago when the 
teams would mire down on the State street thoroughfare : Lowell was not 
thought of in his youth, and while he was growing up the now rich agri- 
cultural region of West Creek township was mainly a marsh. 

When Mr. Pattee was twenty-six years old, on December 13. 1862, he 
married Miss Elizabeth Pattee, and they have lived and plied their daily 
tasks side by side now for over forty years. During this time six children, 
three sons and three daughters, were born to them, and three are living. 
Hattie is the wife of Richard Sailor, a prosperous farmer of Eagle Creek 
township, this county, and they have seven children, all living, Walter, Mun- 
ger, Elmer, Chester, Mabel, Cirilla and Mildred, of whom Walter and Mun- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 373 

ger ha\-e reached the eighth grade in school : Mrs. Sailor was a teaclier for two 
years in her home county. Miss Cora, who was educated in tlie Lowell 
high school, is noted for her special proficiency as an artist in crayon and 
oil, and some of her finely wrought crayon pieces hang on the walls of the 
Lowell National Bank and attract attention from all \-isitors, while her 
exhiliits at the county fair ha\'e always won the rihlions. C\'rus, the only 
son living of Mr. and ih^s. Pattee, took two years" work in the Lowell high 
school and completed the course in the Vories Business College at Lidian- 
apolis in 1902. He is a member of the Lowell band, affiliates with the 
Knights of Pythias, lodge No. 300, at Lowell, and with the Knights of 
Columbia Council No. 37. and is a stanch Republican and an ardent supporter 
of "Teddy" and his party. 

Mrs. Pattee was born on Door prairie, Scipio township, LaPorte county, 
February 13. 1837, and was the second in a family of twelve children, six 
sons and six daughters, she being the oldest of the five survivors ; Melvina 
is the wife of C. C. Pattee, a retired farmer of Lowell; Emily is the widow 
of Israel Koplin, of Kansas ; George is married and farming in LaPorte 
county : and James is married and residing on the old homestead in LaPorte 
county. Mrs. Pattee's father was born in Canada and came to Fluron county, 
Ohio, at the age of twelve, growing to manhood there. He was a carpen- 
ter and joiner by trade, and was also a sailor on the great lakes, having put 
into the port of Chicago when there were but two houses there. He came 
to LaPorte county and purchased land of the government, being among the 
very earlv settlers of that county, and his son James has in his possession 
the parchment deed to the land. He was an old-line Whig and later a 
Republican. He and his wife were members of the Baptist church at Door 
Village, and he helped erect the edifice there. His wife was born in Huron 
county, Ohio, and was seventy years old at the time of her death. 

Mr. and Mrs. Pattee began their domestic life in Yellowhead township 
in Kankakee county, Illinois, and lived for a time in a little log cabin home, 
but prosperity soon came to them and gave them a good home and com- 
fortable circumstances. They resided in Kankakee county until 1882, when 
they took up their home a half a mile from the postoftice of Lowell in West 
Creek township. They remodeled the house into a pretty country residence, 
put up various good buildings on the farm, and their estate is now known 



374 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

as one of the valuable and model farm properties of the township. They 
ha^■e one hundred and six acres lying in West Creek and Cedar Creek town- 
ships, and of this twenty-six acres lie within the corporation of Lowell. 
One of their valued possessions is a parchment deed executed April i, 1848, 
under the signature of President Polk, and this is one of the few docu- 
ments of the kind in west Lake county. 

Mr. Pattee is a Reptiblican. having cast his first presidential vote for the 
first Republican nominee, General Fremont, and he has never deviated in his 
support of the Grand Old Party. Airs. Pattee is a meml>er of the Chri.s- 

tian church. 

DANIEL BEAUMAN STURTEVANT. 

Daniel Beauman Sturtevant, of section 28, Ross townshi]), has lived in 
this vicinity all his life, and from his boyhood days of sixty years ago to 
the present almost the entire development of Lake county has taken place, so 
that few men are better informed by actual personal experience of the ma- 
terial history of this portion of the county. He has lived continuously on 
one farm for over fifty-five years, and all the associations and interests of his 
life are bound up with it, and there it is his good pleasure to pass tlie re- 
maining days of his busy and prosperous career and await the summons 
from an activity that has borne much fruit and been worthy and beneficial 
to the community in general. 

Mr. Sturtevant was born in Porter county, Indiana, just three miles 
east of the farm where he has lived so long, on April jj, 1840. His father, 
John Sturtevant, was born in the town of Barton, Vermont, in 1806, and 
was reared, educated and married there. He came to LaPorte county, In- 
diana, in 1833, being one of the first carpenters to follow his craft in that 
now populous county. In 1836 he moved to Porter county, locating on 
the farm where he remained until 1848, when he settled on the old farm 
in Lake county now owned by his son, and where he died on January i, 
1858. lie belongs to the list of early settlers of the county, and was also 
successful in his general career. He married Miss Louise Cass, who was a 
native of New Hampshire and a cousin of Dr. Lewis Cass, who was one of 
the pioneers and foremost men of Lake county. She died at the age of 
thirty-eight years, having been the mother of three sons and three daughters. 

Mr. D. B. Sturtevant. who was the second child and eldest son, was 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 375 

eight years old wlieii lie went witli his parents to Lal<e county, so that most 
of his boyhood was spent on tlie farm whicii as a man he lias tilled and made 
the source of his livelihood. He is now the owner of about fi\-e hundred 
acres, some of it in Porter count}-, and on this he is still actively engaged in 
general farming and stock-raising. He has about a hundred and fifty head 
of cattle and a good lot of hogs. His farm is one of the model places of the 
township, and he has made it so mainly by his own labors and most efficient 
management. Mr. Sturtevant was a raiser of the registered Herefords for 
a number of years, but has now retired from that business. He has given 
his best years and efforts to this life work, but lias also taken an intelligent 
interest in the world about him, co-operating in community affairs and regu- 
larly casting his ballot at national elections for Democratic principles. 

Mr. Sturtevant was married in 1866 to Miss Eugenie Wood, who was 
born in Iowa, but came to Lake county in girlhood. They are the parents 
of four chiklren, John, Judson, Flora and Carrie. John was a student of 
Valparaiso College. Mrs. Sturtevant was born in Keosauqua, Iowa, Octo- 
ber 31, 1844. a daughter of John and Caroline (Brown) Wood. Her father 
was a native of Vermont and her mother of Virginia. Her great-grand- 
father, David Wood, was a hero in the Revolutionary war, and the gun he 
carried in the war is yet in the family as a souvenir. 

Mrs. Sturtevant was reared and educated in Ohio. She came from a 
family of teachers. Mrs. Sturtevant is a member of the Christian church of 

Deep River. Indiana. 

EDWIN MICHAEL. 

Edwin Michael is one of the native born citizens of Lake county and 
one who has an honored place in the county as an upright man and citizen. 
He is one of the oldest of those still living w'ho were born in this county of 
Lake. He was born September 17, 1S40, being the older of the only two 
living chiklren of John J. and ^^'ealthy Ann (Green) Michael, his brother 
being \\'illiam H. Michael, who is a prosperous farmer in this county and 
a raiser of blooded Durham cattle, and whose personal history will be found 
on other pages of this work. 

His father was a native of New York state, was born March 22, 181 1, 
and died about 1898. He was a carpenter and joiner by trade, and in the 
after years of his career followed farming. He was reared to the age of 



376 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

twenty-eight in New York state, receiving his education in the old-fashioned 
pubhc schools of that early epoch. About 1839 he came to Lake county, 
Indiana, having been married to Miss Green in the state of Michigan. He 
was a poor man when he came to this county, and his first purchase of real 
estate was one hundred and sixty acres of state land, at a cost of about a 
dollar and a half an acre. His first habitation was a litle log cabin, in which 
his son Edwin and the other children were born. He added to his land until 
his estate at one time comprised three hundred acres of choice land. He 
was in politics an old-line Whig, merging later into a Republican, the cardinal 
tenets of which party he advocated all his life. He and his wife were Bap- 
tists. His wife, who was a native of Michigan, died at the age of about 
twenty-si.x years, when her son Edwin was about six years old. 

Mr. Edwin Michael was reared in Lake county, with the exception of 
four years spent in Westville, LaPorte county. He received a good com- 
mon school education and had the benefit of attendance at the well-known 
Westville high school. He also took the literary course at the old University 
of Chicago, when that institution was located on Cottage Grove avenue. He 
taught school for two years in Haskell station in LaPorte county, and for 
two years in Lake county. He is a man of more than ordinary intellectual 
attainments, and as a farmer and as a business man has been noted for his 
progressive ideas and energetic activity. 

When this country was in the throes of war and civil strife he bravely 
offered his services, and his life if need be, to the L'nion and the honor of 
the old flag. He enlisted at Lowell, August 12, 1862, in Company A, 
Ninety-ninth Indiana Infantry, and his regiment rendezvoused at South 
Bend. The first captain w^as Daniel F. Sawyer, but before the companv re- 
turned from the front there were three other captains, namely, K. M. Burn- 
ham, R. H. Wells and Alfred H. Heath. His regiment was assigned to the 
western department under General Sherman, and he was with this intrepid 
commander on his most memorable campaign. He participated at the siege 
and capture of Vicksburg, was at the battles of Lookout Mountain, Chatta- 
nooga and Missionary Ridge, being in the charge up the east end of Mission- 
ary Ridge. Then he was under fire for one hundred continuous days during 
the Atlanta campaign. At the battle of Resaca he was in the hottest fight of 
his career, one of his comrades being shot down at bis side and he himself 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 377 

narrowly escaping tlie storm of death. He was on tlie skirmish Hue at the 
fierce engagemiCnt at Dallas. He made the famous march to the sea across 
the state of Georgia, in which Sherman's men cut a swath sixty miles wide. 
From the sea he was on the long march up through the Carolinas on to 
Washington city. Two dates in his soldier's life he will never forget — the 
surrender of Lee and the assassination of Lincoln. He w-as at Raleigh, 
North Carolina, when the glad intelligence of the former reached the tired 
arm\-. bringing joy and hope of home and friends to the poor soldiers. And 
five days later the death of the martyr president cast a gloom over the entire 
army previously so happy. On reaching Washington he participated in the 
grand review of Sherman's battle-scarred and tattered veterans, and on June 
5, 1865. he received his honorable discharge, after having served his country 
faithfully for three years. He then went home and donned the peaceful garb 
of a civilian, to participate for the re.<^t of his life in the work and public 
activity of his home community. 

Mr. Michael married, January i, 1866, Miss Thirza H. Dyer, and five 
children, a son and four daughters, have graced this union: Margaret A. is 
the wife of H. D. Gerrish, who is engaged m mining in Bay Horse, Idaho, 
and they have one child. Karlton. Earl J., who is a general merchant and 
dealer in mining supplies in the same locality of Idaho, married Miss Roles 
and has one daughter. Miss Ida L., who was educated in the common 
schools and at the Valparaiso Normal, has been a successful teacher in the 
city schools of Hammond for the past three years, and also taught four years 
in her home township. Miss Julia M., who was educated in the Hammond 
high school and at \"alparaiso, is at home w'ith her father ; is a teacher in her 
home township, and taught for two years in Idalio. Miss Edna R. was 
educated in the Hammond high school and is a teacher in Bay Horse, Idaho. 
Mr. Michael m.ay well feel a large degree of pride in his children's enviable 
record in the field of active life. 

Mrs. Michael was born in. W'heaton, Illinois, February 4, 1844. and for 
some time was a successful teacher in that state. She is now an in\-alid. 

Mr. Michael was old enough to cast a vote for Lincoln's second election, 
but was not permitted to vote Ijecause of being in the ranks. However, he 
has actively supported every candidate of the Grand Old Party ever since. 
He was elected in 1888 to the office of trustee of his township, this being 



378 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

the most onerous public office in the county. During his incumbency he 
supervised the erection of three schoolhouses and had to look after the wel- 
fare of twelve schools. He is a man well fitted by intelliger.ee, experience 
and personal integrity to fill any office his fellow-citizens may give him, and 
he is public-spirited and thoroughly interested in everything pertaining to 
the growth and advancement of the county. His farm comprises one hundred 
and seventy-four acres of fine land all in West Creek township, and in the 
summer of 1903 he erected one of the most beautiful and modern residences 
in the township. Fraternally Mr. Michael is a member of Burnham Post 
No. 276, G. A. R.. he being past commander. There are aT)Out sixty-five 
active members of the post at this writing, which is a large body considering 
the fact that the Grand Army is the only organization which never increases 

in number. 

FRANK P. SHERART. 

When the tocsin of war sounded in 1861 and men from all stations and 
walks of life flocked to the standard of the country to uphold the Union 
cause. Frank P. Sherart was among the number who donned the blue uni- 
form and went to the south in defense of the nation's starry banner, and in 
all matters of citizenship he has lieen equally loyal even though he has not 
worn the dress of the soldier. A native of Erie county, Ohio, he was born 
on the 28th of December, 1836, and is a representative of an old Pennsyl- 
vania family of German lineage. His father, George Sherart, was born in 
Pennsylvania in 1800 and in 1809 accompanied his parents on their removal 
to Erie county, Ohio, where he was reared, educated and married. He then 
located on a farm, removing afterward to Allegan county, Michigan, where 
he lived until 1853, when he came to Lake county, Lidiana. He located in 
the southern part of this county and spent his remaining days upon his farm 
in \\'est Creek township, where lie died at the age of sixty-three years. He 
was a Whig in his political affiliation in early manhood, and upon the dis- 
solution of that party he joined the ranks of the new Republican party. His 
religious faith was indicated by his membership in the Presbyterian church. 
His wife, who bore the maiden name of ]\Iary Cuddeback, was born in New 
York in 1799 and died in 1892 at the very advanced age of ninety-three 
years. She was of Holland descent. In the family of I\Ir. and ^Irs. George 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 379 

Sherart were seven cliildren, three sons and four daugliters. all of whom 
reached adult age. 

I^'rank P. Sherart, now well known in Lowell and Lake county, was 
the fifth child and third son of that family. He came to Lake county in 
1854. when but se\"enteen or eighteen years of age. His education was 
acquired in the public schools of Michigan, Ohio and Lidiana, and about 
1858 he went from the last named state to Caldwell county, Missouri, where 
he was engaged in teaching in the district schools for four terms. About 
1861 he returned to Lake county and began farming in West Creek town- 
ship, but the same year he responded to his country's call for aid to preserve 
the L'nion, enlisting as a member of Company B. Twentieth Indiana \^olun- 
teer Infantry. He served as a pri\ate of that company for two years and 
was then honorably discharged on account of physical disability. He re- 
turned to his home, but as soon as he had sufficiently recovered his health he 
re-enlisted, this time becoming a member of Company C, One Hundred and 
Thirty-eighth Indiana Volunteer Infantry. He joined the regiment as a 
private and was afterward commissioned second lieutenant of Company C, 
with which he served for three months, after which he returned to Indian- 
apolis, Indiana. His next enlistment made him a member of Company K, 
One Hundred and Forty-second Indiana Infantry, but though he joined this 
command as a private he was soon made second lieutenant and was afterward 
promoted to the rank of adjutant of the regiment. He served until after the 
close of the war when, in July, 1865, he was honorably discharged. He was 
a brave and loyal soldier and gallant officer and he never faltered in the 
performance of any duty throughout his military experience. 

On returning to private life ]\Ir. Sherart engaged in farming in West 
Creek township. Lake county, but in 1865 removed to Lowell, where he 
began merchandizing, carrying on that pursuit for a number of years. He 
was also for several years engaged in contracting and bridge building, but 
is now living retired, having acquired a competence which enables him to put 
aside his business cares and spend his remaining days in the enjoyment of the 
fruits of his former toil. 

On the 23d of September, 1868, ]Mr. Sherart was united in marriage 
to Miss Sarah Craft, a daughter of H. W. and Mary R. (Beach) Craft, 
who came from Fredericktown, Knox county, Ohio, to Lake county, Indiana, 



380 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

in March. if^^J- They settled at Crown Point. The Craft family traces its 
ancestry back to 1050. About that time the spelling of the name was changed 
from Croft to its present form. H. W. Craft, the father of Mrs. Sherart. 
was a miller and millwright by trade and built a mill at Crown Point and 
also one at Lowell. He also became a large landowner and was prominent 
and influential in industrial circles in this part of the state. To him and 
his wife were born seven children, two sons and five daughters, of whom 
Mrs. Sherart is the third child and third daughter. By her marriage she 
has become the mother of two children: Maude, the elder, is the wife of 
Theodore Henry, who is assistant manager of the Denver Republic, pub- 
lished at Denver. Colorado, and they have one son. Sherart. who is now 
four months old. Charles, the younger child, is an electrician located at 
Hammond. Lidiana. 

Mr. Sherart has voted for each presidential candidate (jf the Repub- 
lican party since casting his first presidential vote for Abraham Lincoln in 
i860. He has been a trustee of the town of Lowell, but has never been very 
active in seeking public office, preferring to do his duty as a private citizen. 
His business interests have largely claimed his time and attention, and 
through their careful conduct he has e^'entually won a very gratifving 

measure of prosperity. 

FRED L. SUNDERMAN. 

Fred L. Sunderman is one of the representative citizens and agri- 
culturists of West Creek township, and a man who, by his industry, honest}' 
and integrity, has proved himself worthy of the confidence of the public. 
He is a fine type of the young and progressive farmer, and has lieen very 
successful in this line of work, but he is also well remembered in the township 
for his excellent work as an educator, and his influence and efforts are still 
cast strenuously for higher ideals in all departments of civilization. 

He is a native son of the township in which he has played so important 
a part since arriving at manhood. He was born April 9. 1866, and is the 
third of the eight children, three sons and fi\"e daughters, born to Simon and 
Lena (Moeller) Sunderman. Seven of the children are yet living, three in 
West Creek township, and the others are as follows: Simon is a farmer of 
Vinemont, Alabama, and is married ; August, who is a successful rancher 
at Pilot Rock, Oregon, ha\ing a wife and family, is also a minister of the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 381 

Christian church, and after Ills education in the public schools he took a 
theological course at Berea College ; Margaret, who is a resident of Chicago, 
is a successful teacher in the city schools; Lena is a resident of Lowell, and 
wife of Peter Danstroni. 

The history of father Sunderman is most edifying to this generation, 
and shows what German pluck and perseverance can do in this country. 
He was born in Lippe-Detmold, Germany, in 1831, and is still living in 
West Creek township, being the owner of the estate of one hundred and 
thirty-four acres which his son Fred now conducts for him. He was reared 
and educated in his native land, and was there married to the good woman 
who so nobly assisted him through many subsequent years. While in young 
manhood he emigrated to America, embarking on a sailing vessel at Bremer- 
haven, and being on the ocean six weeks before he landed at New York. 
He came at once to Lake county. Lrdiana. and about forty dollars in cash was 
all the worldly possessions he had at the outset of his career. He began 
wage-earning at thirteen dollars a month, and after continuing this for a 
year came to W^est Creek township, where for three years he worked on the 
shares. He finally purchased eighty acres, going in debt for it, but by indus- 
try lie cancelled the indebtedness and continued adding to his landed estate 
until he now has one hundred and thirty-four acres, with all its excellent 
improvements, forming a monument to his former diligence and prosperity 
from small beginnings. He has never aspired to office, but is a stanch 
Republican and supports the doctrines of his party. He is a member of the 
German Methodist denomination at Cedar Lake. His good wife, who was 
born in the same part of Germany as he, died in 1890, and she was an indus- 
trious and frugal woman. While in Germany she worked for a money con- 
sideration of four dollars per year, which in itself is a graphic illustration of 
the difference in economic conditions on the two sides of the Atlantic. 

Mr. Fred L. Sunderman was reared in his home township. After he 
had completed his training in the common schools, in the fall of 1885 he 
entered the Valparaiso Normal, where he took the teachers" course, and 
came home from there to engage in the teaching profession, which he fol- 
lowed in his Iiome township with great success for eight years. Besides his 
work in the teachers" course at Valparaiso, he also graduated in the iiharmacy, 
scientific and classical departments of this well-known school. He still 



382 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

retains his enthusiasm for the education of tlie masses and tlie increasing and 
broadening of the individuahty of every girl and boy in America. 

May 12, 1898, Mr. Sunderman married Miss AngeHne Fleming, and 
a son and a daughter ha^'e been born to them, named Ruth Bernice and 
Charles Fleming. Mrs. Sunderman was born in Tazewell county, Illinois, 
December 12, 1868. Her father, William Fleming, is still iiving, being a 
prosperous retired farmer residing in Delavan, Illinois. Mrs. Sunderman 
was reared in Illinois, and received a fine higher training at the Normal 
University of Illinois, also at a normal in Ohio, and finished the scientific 
course at the Valparaiso Normal in the class of 1896. She was a very suc- 
cessful teacher for ten years before her marriage, one year of the time being 
spent at Geneva, Indiana, and the other years in Illinois. Both ]Mr. and 
Mrs. Sunderman are lovers of good literature, and in the busy activity of life 
have not forgotten how to study and apply their minds and thoughts to the 
things of the mental and the spiritual domains. They are both attendants 
of the Lake Prairie Presbyterian church, and contribute in accordance with 
their means to the benevolences. Mr. Sundemian by his uprightness in 
conduct and integrity in all of life's relations has gained the confidence of 
his fellow-citizens to an un\isual degree, as is attested by the fact that he 
received the nomination for trustee of West Creek township and, at the 
present writing, is a candidate with absolute certainty of success at the 

hustings. 

EDWARD BATTERMAN. 

E. Batterman, proprietor of a blacksmith and machine shop at Hobart, 
was born in Will county. Illinois, March 5, 1858, and is a son of Charles 
and Johanna (Dasher) Batterman. both of whom were nati\es of Germany, 
the father having been born in Hanover and the mother in Hamburg. They 
came to America, establishing their home in Illinois, aufl there the subject of 
this review was reared, pursuing his education in the common schools of 
Will county. After putting aside his text-books he learned the trade of a 
blacksmith, serving a two years' apprenticeship in Hobart, Indiana. He 
began work in this line at the age of twenty-two years, an^l on th.e com- 
pletion of his apprenticeship was employed in the railroad shops of the 
Nickle Plate road for about six months. In 1880 he opened a shop of his 
own at Hobart, this establishment being only sixteen by twenty feet. Here 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 3S3 

he has since remained, and has huih one of the finest blacksmith and machine 
shops in the county. The buiUhng is forty by one hundred feet, two stories 
in height, and is constructed of brick. There is a wagon shop, twenty-four 
by forty feet, in addition to the other department. He is now recognized 
as one of the leading business men of the town, a prominent representative 
of its industrial interests. In his chosen field of labor he has become an 
excellent workman, and his capability and relial)le business methods have 
formed the strong elements in hi-s successful career. 

In 1882 Mr. Batterman was united in marriage to Miss Carrie Richards, 
and they have one daughter, Lena, who is now the wife of Plin Trusdale, of 
Chicago. Mr. Batterman has been a life-long Republican, and upon the ticket 
of that party was elected town treasurer, which position he now holds. He 
belongs to the Independent Order of Foresters, Lodge No. 141, and the 
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Lodge No. 144. and in the latter has 
taken the degrees of the encampment. He is well known in northwestern 
Indiana, his business extending largely over Lake and adjoining counties. 
His shop is one of the leading industries of the kind in this part of the state, 
and in addition to the work which he does as an artisan he handles all kinds 
of agricultural implements and sells directly to the farmers. As a citizen 
he has contriliuted in no small degree to the upbuilding and development of 
Hobart, and whatever tends to benefit the community receives his endorse- 
ment and co-operation. 

CHARLES GRUEL. 

The German-American element in our citizenship has long been recog- 
nized as an important one, for from an early age the Teutonic race has 
carried civilization into pioneer districts of the world and has introduced the 
progress made in the fatherland. i\Ir. Gruel is a worthy representative of the 
German people, and in his life record has shown many of the commendable 
traits of the men of his nationality. He was born in Pomerania, Germany, 
October 9, i860, and when eleven years of age was brought to America, be- 
coming a resident of Chicago. He attended school there during the two 
years of his residence in that city, and in 1873 he came to Hobart. Here he 
worked in a brickyard for a time, and was afterward engaged in the saloon 
business there for about ten years. In 1893 he established a meat market 
and also began dealing in live-stock. He feeds, sells and ships stock, and 



384 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

operates quite extensively in this line at the present date. He has also built 
some business blocks in Hobart and has thus contributed in appreciable 
manner to the substantial development of the town. 

Tn 1884 Mr. Gruel was united in marriage with ]\Iiss Emma Krieger, a 
native of Porter county, whence she remo\'ed to Lake county, Indiana. 
Her father was Frederick Krieger, an early settler of Porter county and of 
German lineage. Mr. and Mrs. Gruel have one daughter, Matilda. Mr. 
Gruel is one of the leading business men of Hobart, and his private afifairs 
are capably and successfully conducted, while his co-operation in public 
measures has been a factor in the development and improvement of the town. 
He is a most earnest and stah^■art Republican, and he belongs to the Inde- 
pendent Order of Odd Fellows and the Knights of Pythias fraternity. He 
was reared in the Lutheran faith, and at all times his life has been actuated by 
honorable principles, which lia\-e formed the basic element in his success. 

ANDREW J. SMITH. 

Andrew J. Smith, editor of the Hobart Gazette, at Hobart, Indiana, 
has been numbered among the enterprising citizens of this Lake county 
town for nearly twenty years, and for the past fifteen years has been identified 
with the Gazette. This is the only newspaper of the town, having always 
maintained its own against several ephemeral rivals that have for varying 
periods set up and then struck their editorial tents in this town. Like all 
newspapers, the Gazette has not traveled a continuous "primrose path," nor 
vet h.as it had many vicissitudes or crises in its e.xistence, but under the con- 
servative and business-like management of its publishers, who have always 
given the people a sheet worth reading, it has enjoyed a continually increas- 
ing success, and is now numl)ered among the substantial, permanent and 
prosperous institutions of Hobart. The Gazette was founded in Hobart in 
August, 1889, by George Narpass and G. Bender, and under foreclosure 
sale and at the instance of a number of citizens was bought by Mr. Smith 
in the following December. The plant is up-to-date and complete for a town 
of the size, having a large power cylinder press, and in circulation and gen- 
eral patronage the paper ranks among the foremost of the county. The 
Gazette is conducted on independent lines, the two publishers being of 
opposite political tendencies, and thus their paper is unbiassed and practical 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 385 

in treating" all questions and problems of community and county concern. 
While their endeavors are most successfully directed toward making their 
publication a weathervane to indicate the direction of public opinion and a 
mirror of current e\ents, their Cdlumns also always show a public-spirited 
interest in the welfare of town and county and their editorial iniluence is 
ever for the progress and upbuilding of the community's institutions and 
interests. 

Mr. Smith, most of whose adult life has thus been identified with 
Hobart, was born at Mottville. St. Joseph county, Michigan, March 20, 
i86t, being one of five children, two boys and three girls, born to John A. 
and Emeline (Shellenberger) Smith. His father died in February, 1900, 
but his mother is still living on the home farm of three hundred acres in 
Elkhart county, Indiana. 

Mr. Smith had the wholesome rearing and training of a farmer boy, 
living from the age of five to eighteen on the farm in Elkhart county. He 
had taught one term of school before he was eighteen, and from the time 
he attained that age until he entered newspaper work in 1890 he was almost 
continuously engaged in that profession, the last four years of the time 
having been spent as principal of the Hobart schools, so that iiis residence in 
this town dates from August, 1886. In the interims of his teaching he 
studied at the Northern Indiana Normal School at Valparaiso, and in 1885 
graduated in the scientific class of that institution. During three summers 
before 1890 he conducted normal classes in Elkhart county, and had a 
reputation in that county as one of the best instructors engaged "in that line 
of work. By his purchase of the Ga::cfte plant late in 1889 his energies were 
directed to newspaper work, and he has made that his principal vocation to 
the present. He was sole owner of the plant until the fall of 1891, when 
he sold a half interest to Mr. Nevin B. White, and the firmi has since been 
Smith & White. They also carry on a general real estate, loan and insur- 
ance business. 

July 7. 1884, ]\Ir. Smitli married Miss Elva L. Stiwaid, of Lorain 
county, Ohio. There are no children of this marriage, and after twenty 
years of happy wedded life Mr. Smith lost his wife on February 2, 1904. 

Mr. Smith has never held office, but has been nominated for county 
auditor of Lake county in 1904 on the Democratic ticket. He has at various 

25 



386 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

times had nominations to local offices urged upon him. In his individual 

political beliefs he is a Democrat of the old-time, conservative, sound-money 

stamp, and as a private citizen is interested in the success and growth of his 

party. He has been a Mason for the past seventeen years, was master of his 

lodge for seven years, and has since been secretary. He affiliates with 

M. L. McClelland Lodge No. 357, F. & A. M., at Hobart ; Valparaiso 

Chapter No. 79, R. A. M.,- at Valparaiso; Valparaiso Commandery No 28, 

K. T., at Valparaiso; is a member and past chancellor commander of Hobart 

Lodge No. 458, Knights of Pythias ; a member of Hobart Tent No. 65, 

K. O. T. M. He is secretary and treasurer of the Hobart Gun Club, and 

is an active member of various social organizations. He was christened anrl 

reared in the faith of the Dutch Reformed church, of whicli his mother 

is still a member. 

MRS. ELIZA L. MARVIN. 

Mrs. Eliza L. Marvin, who passed from among the living July 31. 1904, 
was a foremost representative of the remarkable pioneer women so few of 
whom remain in Lake county from the days gone by. All history shows how 
conspicuous a part the wives and daughters ha\e played in the national 
development and material, social and intellectual welfare of the country, and 
the pioneer class to which Mrs. Marvin belonged is especially worthy of 
honor when the annals of a section of country like Lake county are under 
consideration, as in this volume of historical and biographical narrative. 
The women were often no less forward than the men in blazing the way of 
civilization and making the wild country produce of the fruits necessary to 
mankind. Mrs. Marvin had been a resident 'of Lake county since 1847, ^"'' 
she could look back to the time when this part of Indiana was in its vir- 
ginity, and she had witnessed the wonderful development which has trans- 
formed a profitless section of country into as rich an agricultural and indus- 
trial community as can be found anywhere in the state. In her time the 
p-reat trunk lines of railroad have been thrown across the county, the manu- 
facturing plants of colossal size and imijortance ha\e Iieen established in the 
Lake cities, and all the institutions of learning, religion and charity have 

grown up. 

Mrs. Marvin was born in Wayne county, Michigan, Augiist 13, 1827, 
so that her life has spanned, with its seventy-seven years, the gulf from the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 387 

most primiti\-e times of the middle west to tlie present phenomenal develop- 
ment of civilization in the same territory. She was the eldest of seven chil- 
dren, four sons and three daughters, born to Hiram S. and Mary W. 
(Holley) Fuller, and of these she had just one brother living, Charles Fuller, 
who is married and resides at Salida, California. Hiram Fuller was born in 
the old Green [Mountain state of \^ermont in 1801, and died in Julv. 1878. 
He was reared in his native state till he had almost reached manhood, and 
his common school education was finished off at a seminary. His parents 
moved to Whitehall, New York, and he resided there for eight en" ten years. 
From New York he came west to Michigan and settled at Northville, in the 
pioneer days, and purchased some timber land and began his career as a 
farmer. In those early days he often drove an ox team to Detroit for pro- 
visions. He sold his one hundred and sixty acres in the fruit belt of Michi- 
gan and in 1847 came to Lake county. Indiana, and located on a pre\-ious 
purchase of four hundred acres of wild land in West Creek township. Their 
settlement in the county was at an early enough date that the deer were still 
plentiful, and Mrs. Mar\-in remembers hax'ing seen as many as ninety at a 
time in the vicinity of the homestead. Mr. Fuller was for man)' years a 
Whig in politics, but from the birth of the Republican party espoused its 
principles till his death. He was a man of much decision of character, was 
a friend of education and all interests conducive to the welfare of his com- 
munity, was domestic in his tastes and a lo\-er of home and children, and 
his beneficent influence continued to live in the noble womanhood of his 
daughter. He and his wife were memliers of the Presbyterian cb.urch. 
and he lielped found the church in West Creek tovvuship and assisted in the 
building of the church edifice. Mrs. Marvin's mother was a native of York 
state, and was born in the Genesee valley iri September. 1808, and died in 
1878. having been reared and educated in New York state. She was a kind 
and affectionate mother, and the spirit of her teachings and her character is 
still potent in the world. 

Mrs. Marvin was a young lady of about twenty-one years when she 
came to Lake county, and her education had already lieen completed in the 
common schools and an academy in Michigan. She was an assistant in the 
Northville public schools for about two years and also followed the profes- 
sion of teaching after she came to Indiana. 



388 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

On December 6, 1851, she was united in marriage with Mr. Charles 
Marvin. He was born in the state of Connecticut, and died June 16, 1892. 
He was reared by his uncle and aunt and received a good education. His 
younger years were spent in the capacity of a salesman in the south, being in 
New Orleans for six months, after which he came north. Much of his life 
was spent as a merchant, but after his marriage he became an agriculturist. 
He was thrifty and a good financial manager, and at the time of his mar- 
riage he owned about six hundred acres of land in West Creek township. He 
was a strong anti-slavery advocate, and followed the banner of the Republican 
party until his death. He was a very successful stock-raiser and farmer, 
and was known and admired throughout Lake county for his firm integrity 
and prominence in the affairs of citizenship. He was reared in tlie Pres- 
byterian faith. 

At her husband's .death Mrs. Marvin had to assume a large business 
responsibility in the management of the estate left her, and during the sub- 
sequent years she displayed an acumen and sagacity rarely found in those 
of the gentler sex. She was a genial and cordial lady, and had many friends. 
Her bright mind delighted to wander among the scenes of early days, and on 
the page of her memory was written a record of many events and scenes of 
the first half of the past century. She had seen the city of Chicago when 
teams were stalled along the business thoroughfares of Lake street on account 
of the mud and mire, and she also knew the city with its population of 
nearly two millions. She was a woman of charitable and generous instincts, 
and never failed to respond to benevolent causes worthy of her consideration. 

Mr. and Mrs. Marvin had no children of their own, but in the goodness 
of their hearts they adopted a boy and a girl, named Edward Prosser and 
Ellen Rollins, and reared and educated them, surrounding them with the 
best of influences and comforts. The former died after reaching young 
manhood, and the latter married Philip Stuppy, a farmer of West Creek 
township. Mrs. Marvin retained until the last the active management and 
oversight of the estate of three hundred acres, part of which is located in 
Illinois, and she had a beautiful home in which to pass the final years of so 
useful and noble a career as had been vouchsafed to her. 

N. P. BANKS. 

N. P. Banks, one of the practical and progressive farmers of Hobart 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 389 

township, resides on Section 6, and for many years has been a resident of the 
county. He was born in Lake county, Ohio, September 25. 1845. '^"^ '''' 
the paternal line is' of Holland-Dutch lineage. His great-great-grandfather 
was born in Holland and, coming to America, served as a soldier in the 
Revolutionary war. Oriii Banks, the father iif X. P. Banks, was born in 
New York and was reared and married there, the lady of his choice being- 
Miss Olive Brown, whose birth occurred in the Empire state and who was 
of English descent. He emigrated to Ohio in an early day, settling in Lake 
county, w'hence in 1845 he removed to LaPorte county, Indiana, establishing 
his home just within the boundary limits of LaPorte city. He afterward 
lived in Scipio township, that county, and iri 1852 he came to Lake county, 
settling in Ross townshii), where he carried on farming. His last days, how- 
ever, were passed in Hobart township, where he died at the age of fifty- 
seven years. He was a very public-spirited man, and was justice of the 
peace for a number of years. He also belonged to the Baptist church, was 
very active and zealous in its work, filled the office of deacon and did e\'ery- 
thing in his power to advance the cause of Christianity in his community. 
His life was honorable, his actions manly and sincere and he left to his family 
the priceless heritage of an untarnished name. His wife, a most estimable 
lady, lived to be about seventy-two years of age. In their family were 
twelve children, of whom two died in infancy, while ten reached manhood 
or womanhood and eight are now living. 

N. P. Banks is the youngest son and eleventh child of the family. anf1 
was but six weeks old when he landed in LaPorte count}-. Indiana, with his 
parents. Seven years later he came with them to Lake county, and was 
largely reared in Hobart township, acquiring his education in the pul.ilic 
schools. He was but sixteen years of age when in 1862 he enlisted in 
Miller's Chicago Battery for three years' service. He was No. 4 on the gun, 
and was afterward corporal chief of the caisson and gunner. During the 
last year of his service he held the rank of sergeant and received an hon- 
orable discharge in 1865, after having been a member of the army for almost 
three years. He was the youngest n-ian in his company, and he took part in 
seventeen important battles and thirty-four skirmishes, including many of the 
most hotly contested engagements of the war. Among the number were the 
battles of the Atlanta campaign, and though he was often in the thickest of 



390 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

the figlit he did not receive even a scratch in all of his service. \\'hen the 
country no longer needed his aid he was honorably discharged at Chicago 
in 1865. and returned to his home in Lake county with a most creditable 
military record. 

Desirous of enjoying better school advantages Mr. Banks then attended 
high school for one term, and later he engaged in teaching school through 
four winter seasons, while in the summer months he worked for wages on 
the farm. 

On the 14th of February, 1869, occurred the marriage of ^Ir. Bank.- 
and ]\Iiss Clara E. Chandler, a daughter of T. P. and Betsey (W'oodmanseel 
Chandler. The parents were nati\-es of \^ermont and in their family were 
four children, of whom ]\Irs. Banks is the youngest. Her birth occurred 
in the Green Mountain state January i. 1850. and by her marriage she has 
become the mother of six children : Mary, the wife of J. ^I. Sholl ; Carrie E., 
who is attending college at Oberlin. Ohio: Myrtle L., who is engaged in 
teaching in the schools of Hobart ; Bessie, the wife of Rev. Dunning Idle, a 
celebrated minister of the JMethodist Episcopal church ; Flora, who is attend- 
ing school in Hobart: and ]\Iarian, deceased. 

After his marriage I\Ir. Banks located upon a farm in Hobart township 
and has since been engaged in general agricultural pursuits. He now has 
two hundred and forty acres of land, which is a well developed property, the 
fields being highly cultivated, while upon the farm are good buildings and 
all modern ecjuipments. This constitutes one of the attractive features in 
the landscape, and a glance indicates to the passer-liy the care and super- 
\-ision of an enterprising. progressi\-e owner. ]Mr. Banks is a stockholder 
and also a director in the First State Bank of Hobart. Mr. Banks is a 
director of the Lake County Farmers' ^^lutual Insurance Company, tjrgan- 
ized some years ago on a small scale, and now embracing the whole county. 
There are 1,310 policies and the insurance in force is about $2,150,000.00, 
which exists amongst the best farmers of the county. There are fi\'e direct- 
ors, four of them being X. P. Banks, Albert Foster, Star A. Brownell and 
John Borger. In public affairs he has also been prominent and influential, 
and his influence is always given on the side of right, reform and improve- 
ment. He was township trustee of Hobart for five years, and he has always 
been a stanch Republican, putting forth strenuous effort in behalf of the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 391 

party. He maintains pleasant relations with liis old army comrades through 

his membership in Hobart Post Xo. 411, G. A. R., and he also belongs to the 

Odd Fellows society, Xo. t,t,^. at that place. In matters of citizenship he is 

as true and loyal as when he followed the nation's stari^y baiiner upon the 

battlefields of the south. 

AUGUST VOLTMER. 

August Voltmer is a representative of that fine class of German-Ameri- 
can citizens who have been such an important factor in the development of 
th.e material resources and in the social and intellectual life of Lake county. 
He is himself still a young man in point of years and vigor, but for the past 
twenty or more years has been making his influence felt for good and ad- 
vancement in this county, and is also prosperous to an unusual degree in his 
own affairs. 

He is a nati\'e of Will count}-. Illinois, where he was born October 28, 
1861, being the fifth in a family of seven children, three sons and four 
daughters, born to Henry and Mary (Rabe) Voltmer. These children are 
all living, and there are three others who are residents of Lake county, 
namely: Henry. Lizzie, and ^lary, who is the wife of William Neidert, a 
farmer of \\'est Creek township. The father of the family was born in 
Germany, in the province of Hano\-er, and he is still living at the age of 
eighty years. He was a mechanic until he came to America, and since then 
he has given his attention to farming. He emigrated to this country when 
a young man. and fn/mi Xew York came to Will county, Illinois, being a 
poor but honest and industrious man, and in the course of his active career 
he accumulated one himdred and sixty acres in W"\\\ county, and also pur- 
chased two hundred and eighty acres in \\'est Creek township of this county, 
where he still makes his home. He receixed his education in both the 
German and English tongues. He is a Republican, and is a member of the 
Lutheran church, as also was his good wife, who died about 1896. 

]\Ir. August Voltmer was reared and educated in W'ill county, Illinois, 
and by early training is familiar with both the German and the English lan- 
guages. He was reared to farming life, and has given principal attention 
to stock-raising. He has a number of pure-Iiloodetl Chester White swine, 
and his cattle are of high-grade Durhams. 

He was married, May 2. 1897, to Miss Lena Balgemann. and of this 



392 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

union three children have been born. Martha, Hilda and Lydia. Mrs. Volt- 
mer was torn in Kankakee county, Illinois, and was reared in that state, her 
parents both being alive and residents of the county of Kankakee. 

Mr. Voltmer and his brothers own two hundred and seventy-nine acres 
of good land in \\'est Creek township, and he is classed as a prosperous 
agriculturist and a stable citizen of the county, being always interested in 
anything that will advance the interests of Lake county. He is a Republican 
in politics, and cast his first vote for James G. Blaine, since which time he 
has zealously upheld the principles of his party. He and his wife are mem- 
bers of the German Lutheran church in Kankakee county. Illinois, and con- 
tribute of tlieir lueans to all benevolences worthy of their consideration. 

JOHN BRYANT. 

Numbered amorig the early settlers and prominent farmers of Lake 
county, John Bryant well deserves representation in this volume, for in 
business life he has been active, diligent and trustworthy, and in citizenship 
has championed the various measures which have led to the substantial ini- 
provement and upbuilding of this portion of the state. He was born in Rich- 
land county, Ohio, July 20, 1833, ^"f^ comes of the same family to which 
William Cullen Bryant, the poet, belonged. His grandfather was David 
Bryant, a native of New Jersey. His father, Elias Brv'ant, also a native of 
New Jersey, accompanied his parents on their removal to Washington 
county, Pennsylvania, when he was twelve years of age, and there he was 
reared and educated. He was also married in that county, and afterward 
removed to Knox county, Ohio, about 1820. He followed farming in the 
Buckeye state until the fall of 1835, when he came to Lake county, Indiana, 
.settling at Pleasant Grove, in Cedar Creek township. He was one of the 
first settlers here, and he entered land from the government for which he 
paid a dollar and a quarter per acre. This he placed under the plow, trans- 
forming the raw tract into richly culti\'atefl fields, and there he carried on 
general farming until his death, which occurred September 10, 1850, when 
he was sixty-six years of age. He was a zealous and active member of the 
Presbyterian church, in which he served as a deacon. He gave his political 
support to the Whig party and during the early years of his residence in 
Lake county was a school director. He contributed to the pioneer progress 




J^Jti^ y /iyiy^^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 393 

of tb.e county, and liis enterprise and energy made liini a \'a'iued citizen of 
the frontier district. He married Miss Ann Vance, who was ijorn in Wash- 
ington county, Pennsylvania, and was a daughter of Robert Vance, one of 
the pioneer settlers of that state and a native of Ireland. Mrs. Bryant died 
in Take county, Indiana, February 6, 1847, when fifty-five years of age. By 
her marriage she became the mother of six sons, of whom four grew to 
manhood, while one died in infancv in Ohio and the other was killed by 
a rattlesnake bite when thirteen years of age. Arthur V., now m his eighty- 
second year, resides in Tafayette, Indiana. Da\'id died in 1900, at the age 
of seventy-six years. Robert, seventy-se\'en years of age, is extensively 
engaged in farming in Porter county, Indiana. 

John Br}-ant is the youngest of the family. He pursued his education 
in one of the primiti\-e log schoolhouses found in the frontier settlements, 
attending through the winter months until eighteen years of age. In the 
summer seasons he worked upon the home farm, gaining practical knowl- 
edge and broad experience concerning the best methods of promoting agri- 
cultural interests. In 1852 he crossed the plains to California with a horse 
team, traveling north of Salt Lake City on the old Kit Carson route. He 
went first to Grizzly Flats, in Eldorado county, and there on the 15th of 
August, 1852, he was taken ill. The only shelter he had until the following 
December was a pine tree, and he was not able to do any work until the 
following March, when he took a contract to build a ditch to lead the water 
to what was called the dry diggings. After executing this contract he began 
prospecting and was engaged in prospecting and mining until Decemljer, 
1S56, when he went into the valleys, where he remained until 1857. He 
then returned to the east by way of the Panama and Aspinwall route to 
New York, spending two days on the island of Cuba while en route. 

Mr. Bryant continued his journey to Lake county. He went to Hebron 
to visit his brothers David and Robert, and afterward engaged in farming 
until 1858, also bought and sold stock. In January, 1859, he came to Lowell, 
where he engaged in merchandising with his brother, Arthur V., this part- 
nership continuing for two years, at the end of which time John Bryant 
purchased his brother's interest, and soon afterward traded the store for 
eighty acres of land in Cedar Creek township. He removed to the farm 
and continued the work of cultivation and improvement there until 1865, 



394 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

when he sold that property and bouglit another farm, whereon lie carried 
on general agricultural pursuits until 1869. In that year he purchased 
a stock of merchandise at Hebron, where he remained in business until 1874, 
v\'hen he sold his property there and returned to his farm in Cedar Creek 
townsliip, making it his home until 1880, when he also sold there. He 
located then upon tlie farm which is now his home. In February, 1882, he 
again went to California, this time making the journey by rail, to visit his 
relatives who had crossed the plains with him in 1852 — thirty years before. 
He remained in tlie Golden state until April, when he returned to Lowell, 
and in Ma}- of the same year he removed to South Chicago and engaged in 
the grocery business, in which he continued for about three years. On the 
expiration of that period he again came to Lowell and resumed farming, 
which he has since followed. He has a \^aluable tract of land of one hun- 
dred and seventy acres, and the land is arable and highly cultivated, while 
man\' substantial improvements liave been made on the farm and indicate 
his enterprising, progressive spirit. 

On the 2ist of February, i860, ^Ir. Bryant was united in marriage to 
Miss Alary A. Lawrence, a daughter of George \\'. and Julia C. (Haskins) 
Lawrence. Airs. Bryant was born in Michigan, December 28, 1840, and 
was brought to Lake county when only two years old. She died September 
25, 1893, and her many excellent traits of character caused her death to be 
deeply regretted by many friends as well as her immediate family. To Mr. 
and Mrs. Bryant had been born six children : Bertha A., born February 20, 
1861, is the widow of C. C. Phelps, and has lieen for a number of years a 
clerk in the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad office at South Chicago. Luella C, 
born .\ugust 22. 1862. also resides at South Chicago. Marie Vance, born 
July 21. 1867. is now filling the position of stenographer with the Baltimore 
& Ohio Railroad at South Chicago. John D., born at Hebron, April 13, 
187 1, died March 6, 1874. W'inefred Clair, born in Lowell, January 17, 
1875, died on the 6th of September of that year. Julia A., Ijorn September 
17, 1876. is the wife of Ernest Hummel, a son of Ernest Hummel, Sr., city 
treasurer of Chicago. 

Mr. Bryant has been a life-long Republican, active in the work of his 
party and deeply interested in its success, yet never seeking or desiring office 
as a reward for party fealty. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity at 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 395 

Lowell. Lodge Xo. 378, and of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows at 
South Chicago, Lodge No. 245. and he belongs to the Methodist Episcopal 
church. His has been an eventful, useful and interesting life history, for 
he has been familiar with pioneer experiences in Indiana and in the far west, 
and his mind is stored with manv interesting reminiscences of his sojourn in 
the Golden state during the early days of its mining development. 

WTLLIA-M \\'ALLACE ACKERMAN. 

\\'illiam \\'allace Ackerman, whose farming interests, capably managed 
and carefully conducted, result in bringing to him splendid success, is now 
living retired in Lowell. He has attained the advanced age of seventy-seven 
years and in the evening of life is enabled to enjoy a comfortable com- 
petence won through his diligence and honorable dealing. He was born in 
Oakland county, Michigan, February 24, 1827, and represents an old family 
of Holland-Dutch ancestry that was established in New York in colonial 
days. His paternal grandfather. James Ackerman. was Iiorn in Truxton, 
New York, and became one of the pi(ineer residents of ^Michigan. John 
H. Ackerman, the father, was a native of Dutchess county. New York, and 
there spent his early boyhood days. He, too, was one of those who li\'ed in 
Oakland when it was a frontier district, accompanying his parents on their 
removal to the west. After arriving at years of maturity he married Ann 
Wallace, who was born in New York and was a daughter of W'illiam Wal- 
lace, a native of Connecticut. The marriage of Mr. and Mrs. John H. 
Ackerman was celebrated in the Empire state, and they located in Oakland 
county, Michigan, about 1822, spending their remaining days there. His 
first home was a typical pioneer house in the midst of an undeveloped region, 
where the work of progress and improvement had scarcely been begun, and 
J. H. Ackerman did his full share in paving the way for the further develop- 
ment of the county. He died at the age of sixty-three years, having long 
survived his wife, who passed away in 1829. He was twice married, his 
second union b'eing with Miss Amelia Kyes, and to this marriage were l^orn 
seven children, while of the first marriage there were three children. 

William \\'allace Ackerman is the youngest and the only one living of 
the famil}- liorn to John H. and Ann (Wallace) Ackerman. He was but a 
year and a half old when his mother died. He started out in life for himself 



396 ■ HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

at the age of e]e\'en years, going to Erie county. Ohio, where lie worked at 
any employment that he could secure. There he remained until his nine- 
teenth year, when his patriotic spirit was aroused and he offered his services 
to the country then engaged in war with Mexico. He enlisted in Com- 
pany G, Third Ohio Regiment, under Colonel Samuel R. Curtis, and was 
with the C(^mmand for fourteen months as a private. On the ex])iration of 
that period, as the country no longer needed his aid, he returned to his 
home in Ohio, where he remained until the fall of 184S, when he came to 
Lake county. Indiana. 

Here Mr. Ackerman located a land warrant in \A'est Creek township and 
began the development and improvement of a farm. Later he sold that 
property and bought another farm in the same township. L'pon the second 
place he made excellent improvements, but eventually he sold that and again 
purchased a farm in West Creek township, which he still owns. Thus he 
has improved three farm.s in the township, and his labors have resulted 
beneficially in the agricultural development and progress of this portion 
of the state. 

Mr. Ackerman was united in marriage in April, 1853, to Miss Mary 
Pulver, who died leaving a family of seven children: John H. and Alonzo D., 
both deceased ; Theodore L. ; William H., who has also passed away : Ida 
Ann; Jasper L. ; and Charles D. On the 9th of November, 1867, INIr. 
Ackerman was again married, his second union being with Betsey Sanders 
Graves, the widow of AA'illiam F. Graves and the daughter of William and, 
Emma (Harris) Sanders. She was born in AA'est Creek township, Lake 
county, Indiana. May 8, 1844, and her parents were pioneer settlers of Lalce 
county, coming to this state from Erie county, Ohio, in 1838. They settled 
in West Creek township, where they reared their family of twelve children, 
three of whom were born in this county. Mrs. Ackerman is the tenth child 
and third daughter, and was reared in the place of her nativity and has spent 
her entire life in Lake county. She had one son by her first marriage, 
William M. Graves, and liy the second marriage there are four children : 
Linden S., now deceased: Yessie E. : Zada M.: and Zella A. Zada is a 
graduate of the high school and has engaged in teaching for over three years. 
Vessie E. is the wife of S. A. Mulliken, of Chicago. Zella is also a graduate 
of the Ixnvell high school, was a student in Valparaiso College and was a 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 397 

teacher in the Valparaiso kindergarten, and on June 15, 1904, was married 
to Otto DeRoy Mitchell, a druggist in Eaton, Indiana. The following chil- 
dren are of the first marriage of Mr. Ackerman : Theodore S. is extensively 
engaged in the raising of cattle in South Dakota, where he owns a large 
ranch ; Jasper is filling the position of auditor in White county, Indiana ; 
Charles D. is a builder and contractor of Los Angeles, California ; and Ida 
is the wife of S. S. Brandon, of Mobile, Alabama; while William il. Graves, 
the son of ^Irs. Ackerman, is a resident of Lowell. 

^h. Ackerman is the owner of four hundred acres in West Creek town- 
ship and also has property in Lowell. The farm is well improved, and he 
continued its cultivation until 1881, when he removed to Lowell and engaged 
in the agricultural implement business, continuing in commercial pursuits 
for eight years. In 1889 he was appointed postmaster under President 
Harrison, and filled that position for four years. Since the expiration of 
his term he has lived retired from active business, save the supervision of 
his property. Mr. Ackerman has always been a supporter of the Republican 
party since its organization, and was county ditch commissioner for several 
years, during which time he did much toward improving the county through 
the extension of its ditches. This drained the land and, therefore, greatly 
increased its value. He takes an active and helpful part in all measures 
which are of practical benefit in the community, and is widely and favorably 
known throughout the county. He and his wife and children belong to the 
Christian church. His career has ever been honorable and straightforward, 
so that he enjoys in large measure the respect and confidence of his 

fellow-men. 

MRS. SUSANN MOREY. 

The ladies of the nation play a most conspicuous part in the true, 
authentic record of a state and county as well as nation, and in the leading 
records of the citizens of West Creek township none is more worthy of 
representation that Mrs. Morey. She was born in Boscawen, New Hamp- 
shire, March 2, 1826. the third in a family of four children, one son and three 
daughters, born to Dr. Thomas and Sukey (Gerrish) Peach. Mrs. Morey 
is the only survivor. Her father. Dr. Thomas Peach, who was a physician 
and surgeon, was a native of the old Bay state, Massachusetts, and was born 
in 1784, fifteen years before the death of General Washington, and died 



398 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

February 8, 1882. During the early years of his life he resided and was 
reared on a farm. He received a good practical education for those times, 
and between the years of twenty and thirty of his life he sought the medical 
profession. He studied under the direction of Dr. McKinster, of Newbury, 
Vermont, where his parents had nun-ed when he was about seven years of 
age. He practiced according to the allopathic school, and was reasonably 
successful, most of his practice being in New Hampshire. He was a surgeon 
in the war of 1812. 

It was about 1858 when he emigrated to West Creek township, and here 
he resided till his death. Politically he was a Republican, and in a religious 
sense be and bis wife were members of the Congregational church and ardent 
supporters of the doctrines of bis church. He was very emphatic in his 
advocacy of temperance, and was one of the prime movers in the great tem- 
perance reform. His remains are interred in the Lake Prairie cemetery, 
where a beautiful stone marks his last resting place. His wife was a native 
of Boscawen, New Hampshire, and born June 15, 1797, and died December 
6, 1871. She traced her ancestry to England, as Gerrish is an English name. 

Mrs. Susann Morey was born, reared and educated at Boscavi'en, New 
Hampshire. Her home was contiguous to the home of the celebrated Daniel 
Webster. She attended the academy at Boscawen and was a teacher in her 
native state. She wedded Ephraim Noyes Morey, November 26, 1846, and 
four children, two sons and two daughters, were born, and three are lix'ing 
at present. The eldest is Thomas Morey, a resident and farmer of Moun- 
tain View. Missouri, who received a common school education, and married 
Miss Eliza Ann Peach, by whom he has five living children. Mary is the 
wife of W. H. Michael, a prosperous farmer of West Creek township, and 
whose personal history also appears in these pages. William H. Morey, the 
third living child, is principal of the Lowell high school. Lie received his 
primary training in the common scIkioIs and was a student at the normal at 
Terre Haute, Indiana, after which be took a course in law personally and 
was admitted to the bar of his nati\e county of Lake. He graduated in the 
teachers' and scientific course at Valparaiso. He is well known as an edu- 
cator of this county. He married, December 27, 1898, Miss Rhoda L. Smith, 
and two daughters were bom to this marriage, Emeline Gertnide and Helen 
Alice. Mrs. William Morey was born in Greenville, Illinois, January 18, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 399 

1870, and is a daughter of T. Newton and Eineline (Castle) Smith, her 
father stih hving. Her motlier was a nati\e of Darke county. Oliio. ]\Ir«. 
W. H. Morey was educated in the common schools, and she and her hushand 
reside on the old hijmestead with his mother, and they are memhers of the 
Lake Prairie Presbyterian church and he has been chosen superintendent of 
the Sunday school at different times. 

Mr. Morey, the deceased husband of Mrs. Susann Morey, was born in 
Lisbon, New Hampshire, June 6, 1819, and died March 9. ic)02. He was 
reared in the early part of his life as an agriculturist, but was afterwards 
engaged in construction work for different railroads in the states of Rh.ode 
Island and New Hampshire, and then on the Pittsburg and Fort \\'ayne 
Railroad as far as Crestline. Ohio, and was reasonably successful. He 
located in Dubuque, Iowa, in 1857, and was there till the war opened. Fie 
purchased one hundred and forty-fi\-e acres of rather wild land in West 
Creek township when thus county was in its virgin condition. There was 
hardly a fence to lie seen, and Lowell was a mere hamlet. He erected all 
the luiildings on the farm, and the lumber from which the house was built 
was hauled from Michigan. Politically he was a stalwart Republican, and 
he and his wife were devout members of the Congregational church. When 
Mr. Morey died the township of ^^'est Creek lost a valuable citizen and an 
upright and honorable man. 

Mrs. Morey yet resides en her homestead, aged more than tliree- 
fjuarters of a century, and her mental faculties are still clear anrl bright. 
She is known in her communitv as a kind and warm-hearted mother and 
friend, and her cordial and genial manner of greeting the stranger and 
friend makes her home a welcome haven of rest. She is possibly the oldest 
living citizen in West Creek township to-day. This authentic review of 
father and mother Morey will be read and cherished bv many hundreds of 
the people of Lake county, and will lie held sacred by their children when 
they themselves ha\'e passed to the great beyond. 

JAMES GUYER. 

Among her native sons that Pennsylvania has furnished to Lake county 
is numbered James Guyer, now engaged in the livery business in Hobart. 
He was born in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, his natal day being Decern- 



4C0 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

ber 30, 1841. and he is the eldest son of Andrew and Mary Ann (Royce) 
Guyer, who came to the west when James was but eight years of age. They 
settled in Calhoun county, Michigan, and he was reared upon the home farm, 
working in the fields during the summer months, while in the winter seasons 
he attended the public schools. At the age of eighteen he left the parental 
roof, in order that he might earn his own living and went to Branch county, 
Michigan, where he learned the trade of brick-making. He was there em- 
ployed at the time of the outbreak of the Civil war in 186 1. He had watched 
with interest the progress of events in the south, and when an attempt was 
made to overthrow the Union his patriotic spirit was aroused and he enlisted 
as a member of Company H, Eleventh Michigan Volunteer Infantry, as a 
private. He thus served for about two years, and was then honorably dis- 
charged on account of disability, but in the meantime he had participated in 
some important battles. 

After being mustered out Mr. Guyer returned to Branch county, ]\Iich- 
igan, where he remained for about six months, and then went to Na.shville, 
Tennessee, where he was employed by the government as a painter, working 
in that way until 1865. He then again came to the north, locating at Cold- 
water, Michigan, where he was engaged in the manufacture of brick for 
about two years. He next located at LaPorte, Indiana, where he conducted 
a similar industry, and since that time he has traveled quite extensively, 
visiting Iowa, Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois and various parts of In- 
diana. He came to Hobart in 1872 and established a brick manuafcturing 
industry, doing the first work vihere the National Fire Proofing Company 
plant is now located. He was there for about four years, after which he 
went to Lowell, Indiana, and afterward to Michigan. Later lie returned to 
this state and in 1893 he again came to Hobart, where he established the 
livery barn that he now conducts. 

In 1869 Mr. Guyer was married to Miss Sarah Ann Hutchins, who was 
born in Ohio, and there are four children of this union: Mnry. deceased; 
Burton ; William ; and Philip, who has also passed away. Air. Guyer is con- 
nected with Hobart Post No. 411, G. A. R., of which he is now commander, 
and he is likewise a faithful follower of the teachings of the Masonic fra- 
ternity, belonging to Earl Lodge No. 357, F. & A. M. In his political views 
he is a Democrat. He is quite well known in this county, and he possesses 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 401 

many traits of character which have gained for him the regard and friendship 

of his fellow-men. 

GEORGE BOYD. 

George Boyd, of Ross townsliip. is of the second generation of the 
family who have heen so conspicuous in the agricultural history of Lake 
county from its early history to the present. He is himself one of the younger 
class of farmers of his township, and is of the energetic and progressive sort 
that takes farming out of its ruts and empirical methods of the past and 
furnishes it a smooth course and adapts scientific processes to soil culture. 
Mr. Boyd has also taken his place among the public-spirited citizenship of 
the county, and to social, material and intellectual progress gives his interest 
and co-operation. 

Mr. George Boyd is the eldest son of Eli 'Si. and Agnes ( Hyde) Boyd, 
the former of whom has lived in Lake county ever since 1S48 and is one of 
the old and well known farmers and useful citizens, having been identified 
with the making of Lake county in many of its present essential features. 
The son George was born in Ross township, Lake county, October g, 1877. 
He was educated in the common schools of Ross township and at the Northern 
Indiana Normal College at Valparaiso, finishing his literary training at 
Northwestern University, at Evanston. He then engaged in farming in his 
native township, and has continued at it with great success to the present 
time. He does general farming and stockraising, operating a farm of three 
hundred acres, a part of the large estates of the Boyd brothers. 

Mr. Boyd is a leading young Republican of his township, and as far 

as his business interests permit concerns himself with public affairs both of 

national and local importance. He was married, Februarv' 5, 1901, to Miss 

Addie Guernsey, the daughter of Joseph and Elizabeth Guernsey, well-known 

citizens of this county. Two children have been born to them. Lenore 

and Lucile. 

JOHN STARK. 

Lake county can boast of no finer class of citizens than the German- 
Americans who have settled in such number within its boundaries, and, 
whether born in the fatherland or children of German-born parents, these 
men and women have proved their substantial and solid qualities in all the 
relations of life. The farming communities have been especially benefited 

26 



402 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

by them, and without their industry and excellent management it is doubtful 
if this count)' could so rapidly have progressed to a front rank in the agri- 
cultural communities of the state. One of the most representative of the 
men with the blood of German parents coursing in their veins is Mr. John 
Stark, of West Creek township, who belongs to a family which has been 
identified with Lake county since its pioneer epoch. His father and mother, 
like so many others, came to the count}' years ago, poor but honest, and 
with their industry accumulated a good estate before their years of activity 
were past. 

Mr. John Stark was born in St. John township. Lake county, Septem- 
ber 30. 1855, and is the third in age of the eleven children born to Joseph 
and Mary Ann (Merrick) Stark. A more detailed history of this worthy 
couple and family will be found in the sketch of their son Josepli, who is 
represented elsewhere in this work. 

Mr. Stark was reared on a farm and spent fourteen years of his life in 
the threshing industry. He received both an English and a German educa- 
tion, and in all the essential successes of his life he has been the architect 
of his own fortunes. He began life for himself at the age of twenty-six, 
when he was united in marriage with Miss Susan Portz, on April 26, 1881, 
in St. John township. Ten children have been born of this happy union, and 
all are living at the present writing : Rosa, at home, who was educated in 
the public schools ; Emil J., v.'ho went through the common schools and is 
fond of farming and all kinds of mechanical work: ^la.ry E., who after the 
common schools attended the Lowell and Crown Point high schools ; 
Minnie E., who is in the eighth grade of school work: Adeline B., also 
in the eighth grade; Martha, in the sixth grade of the St. John schools; 
Anna M., in the fourth grade; Frankie, who has been to school one year 
and has never missed a day nor once been tardy; Leonora M. and Johnnie, 
who are the youngest of the family. 

Mrs. Stark was born in St. Jolm township. Lake county, May 2, 1859, 
and was one of the ten children of Peter and Susan (Kraus) Portz. Seven 
of her brothers and sisters are living, as follows : Katie is the wife of Jacob 
Schercr. a carpenter of St. John, and has six children living ; Peter, proprietor 
of the St. John's Hotel at St. John, married Miss Susan Bohr and has five 
children living; John, a prosperous resident of Flammond and for eighteen 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 403 

years in the packing houses of that city, married Susan Giehring, who died 
July II, 1904, and has four hving children; Joseph, who resides with his 
mother at St. John, was educated in the high school at ]MiIwaukee, \\'iscon- 
sin, and for fourteen years was a teacher in his home school ; Barbara is 
the wife of Joseph Jeurgens, a farmer of Juniata, Adams county, Nebraska, 
and has five children living; jMrs. Stark is the next in order of age; Lizzie is 
the widow of Jacob Lauermann, of St. John, and has five living children ; 
Leo, a prosperous farmer of Adams county, Nebraska, married Miss Anna 
Beiriger and has nine living children. All the children of this family were 
bright and intelligent in the work of the schools as well as in after life. 

Peter Portz, the father of Mrs. Stark, was born near the beautiful Rhine 
ri\er in Germany, in 1S19, and died in 1885. He was reared and well edu- 
cated in his native land, and was a teacher for some time after coming to 
America. By trade he was a miller. He was married in Germany, and 
after living there for some years he emigrated across the Atlantic with the 
intention of bettering himself financially. When he landed m New York 
he had almost no money, and he came out to Lake county and liy a life of 
industry and good management accumulated an estate of two hundred and 
sixty acres of fine land. He and his wife were devout members of the 
Catholic church at St. John, and all the children were confirmed in the 
church. Mrs. Stark's mother was born in 182 1 and is still living at this 
writing, eighty-three years of age, and bright and healthy for one so old. 

Mr. and Mrs. Stark purchased two hundred and eighty acres of land in 
West Creek township, and two years later added forty acres more. Their 
present home estate consists of one hundred and sixty acres, on which thev 
have erected a nice country residence, and the entire beautiful farmstead 
is a monument to their lives of industry and worth. Mr. Stark is a lover of 
fine stock, and finds the best grades to be the most profitable, his favorite 
grade of hogs lieing the Chester Whites. He is a Democrat in politics, and 
has voted the ticket since the candidacy of S. J. Tilden. He and his wife 
and some of the children are members of St. Edward's Catholic church at 
Lowell, of which Father F. Koenig is pastor, and Mrs. Stark is a member 
of the married ladies' sodality and the girls are members of the young ladies' 
sodality of St. Mary's. 



404 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

HoBART Public Schools. 

Twelve teacliers are employed in the Hobart Public Schools, including 
a superintendent and supervisor of music. Of these, two besides the super- 
intendent are engaged in high school work. The remainder give their entire 
time to work in the grades, one teacher being assigned to each grade. 

The course of study includes eight years' work in the elementary branches, 
reading, writing, number, spelling, language, geography, English history, 
American history, physiology and drawing — the first five subjects being 
studied during the entire eight years, except number, which is not begun 
until the second year, and four years' work in secondary branches. Special 
work in music under a special teacher is carried on througliout the entire 
tW'Clve years. Special work in manual training is done during the first six 
years of the course. 

The present system of schools is the result of a gradual growth extend- 
ing over a period of many years. The development of the schools has kept 
pace with the best educational thought of the times : while the school policy 
of the community has been conservative enough to insure thoroughness and 
avoid waste of time and money, the school authorities have always been eager 
to introduce methods and make changes which were prompted by progressive 
thought in educational matters. Because of the demonstrated importance 
and value of construction work in elementary education a course in manual 
training has lately been introduced and plans are tmder contemplation for 
the further elaboration and organization of this work into the curriculum. 

The present school building is a commodious structure erected at a total 
cost of about thirty thousand dollars, which contains eleven classrooms 
besides a laboratory in the basement. The building has been built in sections, 
two additions having been erected since the original structure was built. 
The original building, built in 1S77 by Trustee M. J. Cook, contained but 
four rooms. In 1892 the increased school population made it necessary to 
erect an addition of two rooms, and another addition of five rooms became 
necessary in 1894. 

The high school was first established by Superintendent A. J. Smith 
during the administration of Trustee James Reper, Jr., by introducing two 
years' work in general history and advanced work in the common branches. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 4U5 

This course was lengthened to three years and enriched during the admin- 
istration of Trustee Seward Ligliter, while P. J. Gristy was superintendent. 
In 1896 the course was further enriched and lengthened to four years, and 
in 1898 it was e.xaminecl and commissioned liy the State Board of Educa- 
tion in the name of A. R. Hardesty, who was superintendent at that time. 
The high school was re-examined and re-commissioned in 190 1 in the name 
of the present superintendent. ^\'. R. Curtis, who was first elected in 1901. 
In the last three years much attention has been given to enriching the high 
school life. The course has been made flexible, athletic and oratorical organ- 
izations have been carefully encouraged, and the equipment has been greatly 
increased. The first material equipment for high-class high school work, 
which was purchased by Trustee X. P. Banks in i8c)8. has been nearly 
doubled by the present incumbent, Trustee A. J. Swanson. 

A special supervisor of music was employed for the first time in 1903. 
This step has proved to be so satisfactory that special work in music is 
assured for the future. 

The schools are a part of the township system and the high school is, 
therefore, a township high school. Pupils from outlying districts are trans- 
ported to the high school at public expense; also transportation is furnished 
for children in the elementary schools who live in districts where the paucity 
of population renders the maintenance of a separate school impracticable. 

Since the high school was first commissioned in 1898 the enrollment 
has increased from about 60 to 82. The fact that the percentage of pupils 
enrolled in the high school is now larger than ever before as compared with 
the total enrollment in the school is especially interesting because it shows 
that an increasing number of citizens are realizing the importance of better 
education for their children. 

For years it has been the will of th.e taxpayers and the ambition of 

trustees to add something each year to the equipment of the schools. This 

policy is a safeguard and a security of the future social condition of the 

communitv. 

JOSEPH B. BERG. 

Joseph B. Berg is one of the stanch German-Americans who stand so 
high in the ranks of citizenship in Lake county, and who are known for 
their energy, honesty and efficiency in all of life's relations. Industry is a 



406 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

keynote in his succesful career, and as he has accompHshecl much for himself 
so likewise has he done his share in the upbuilding and development of the 
county. To no one class of citizens does Lake county owe more of its sub- 
stantial progress and prosperity than to the fine German-American element 
which will be found there in such numbers. 

Mr. Berg was born in West Creek township, Lake county, December 22, 
1862, and is the third in a family of four children, two sons and two daugh- 
ters, born to Bernhard and Katharine (Lang) Berg. He has a sister older 
than himself, named Elizabeth, who is the wife of Anton Huseman, a pros- 
perous farmer of West Creek township ; and a younger sister, Mary, who is 
the wife of Philip Fetsch. a resident of Chicago. His only brother is de- 
ceased. Bernhard Berg, the father, was born in Westphalia, Germany, in 
1834, and died in Crown Point in 1889. He received his education in the 
German language, but also learned English after coming to America. He 
was a young and comparatively poor man when he took passage on a sailing 
vessel and made the long and tedious voyage of weeks' duration to reach this 
land of opportunity and freedom. He came to Lake county and began as a 
wage-earner. He later purchased one hundred and twenty acres of land in 
West Creek to%\'nship, going in debt for most of it, but before his useful 
career came to a close he had been the possessor of six hundred acres of the 
fine land of Lake county, which indicates how successful was his work. He 
was a Democrat in politics, and he and his wife were Catholics, with mem- 
bership in the St. Anthony's church, which he had helped :o build. His 
wife was also a native of Germany, and at the present writing makes her 
residence in Crown Point, being a bright and vigorous old lady of sixty- 
four years. 

Mr. Joseph B. Berg spent his youth as well as his later career in West 
Creek township, and his early education was obtained in the parochial 
schools. He was confirmed in the Catholic church at the age of thirteen. 
He is a practical farmer and stockman, and has given his best efforts and 
years to that honorable industry. He spent one year in Kankakee and 
Will counties, Illinois, engaged in the grain and live-stock business, but after 
that returned to his estate. 

March 4, 1889, he was married to ]\Iiss Louisa Cloidt (but the original 
spelling of the name in Germany was Kloht). Three children have been 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 407 

born to this happy union, and all are living: Fred Joseph, who is in the sixth 
grade of school work and last year attended the parochial school of Crown 
Point, his intellectual fondness being especially for arithmetic; Elizabeth T. 
and Clara jNI.. both in school, and the former in the fourth grade. ^Irs. Berg 
was torn in Kankakee, Illinois, November 2, 1866, a daughter of Joseph 
and Louisa (Klein) Cloidt, and she was educated in the English schools. 
Both her parents were natives of Germany, and after coming to this country 
her father participated in the Civil war. He was wounded in the hip at the 
Ijattle of Gettysburg, and he cut out the bullet with his own pocket-knife 
and still preserves the shot as a memorial of his brave soldier life. He had 
a brother Anton who was killed in the war. For a long time he was in 
the grain business at Beecher. Illinois, but is now living retired at Sollitt, 
Illinois. He is a Democrat in politics. His wife was born in Westphalia, 
Germany, and there were nine children, two sons and seven daughters, in 
their family, five of whom are living and all in Illinois except Mrs. Berg. 
Mrs. Berg is a quick, smart and energetic woman, an able assistant to her 
husband, and an esteemed member of the social circles of this community. 

r^lr. and Mrs. Berg have five hundred and sixty-seven acres of good 
land in ^^'est Creek township, and in 1893 they erected their beautiful resi- 
dence, followed in the next year by a commodious new barn. Their farm- 
stead is a model in appearance and productivity, and there is not a better 
one in the township. They have a fine lot of Hereford cattle, besides some 
excellent horses, and Mr. Berg is known throughout this part of the county 
for his excellent judgment on the points of stock. He owns stock in a brick 
and tile company at Eagle Lake, Illinois. Mr. Berg is a Democrat, but has 
usuallv cast his vote according to his independent opinions. He and his wife 
and eldest children are members of St. Anthony's Catholic church at Klaas- 
ville. Indiana. Mr. Berg is a stockholder and the vice-president of the Crown 
Point Pure Food Company, which was incorporated to raise currants and 
manufacture iellies and preserves, this being an enterprise of much value 
to the farming district of Lake county. 

ERNEST TRAPTOW. 

Ernest Traptow is filling the position of township trustee in Calumet 
township, and no more capable official can be found in Lake county or one 



408 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

who is more loyal to the public interests and welfare. He resides in Tolles- 
ton and he has a wide acquaintance in this portion of the state, for he is a 
native son of Lake county, his birth having occurred at Clarke on the 29th 
of December, 1863. His- parents, Frederick and Caroline (Kurth) Trap- 
tow, were natives of Germany and on crossing the Atlantic to ihe new world 
they made their way into the interior of the country, settling in this county 
about 1861. They established their home in Calumet township, where the 
father spent his remaining days, his death occurring in 1897. His widow 
still survives. Their family numbered five children, three sons and two 
daughters, and those still living are Ernest, Reinhart and Bertha. 

Mr. Traptow is the second child. He was reared on the old home farm 
in Calumet township and pursued his education in the schools of Tolleston 
and in the district schools. When he had put aside his text books he learned 
the carpenter's trade under the direction of his father, who was a carpenter 
and joiner as well as an agriculturist and built most of the houses in Tolles- 
ton. After the death of his father Mr. Traptow continued to engage in 
carpentering, and has erected many of the houses in Tolleston and Clarke. 
He continued to engage in contracting and building until he was elected trus- 
tee of Calumet township in 1900, since which time he has given his full at- 
tention to the duties of the office and has thus largely promoted the welfare 
of his community. He was elected to this position on the Democratic ticket, 
and he has always been found as a stalwart advocate of Democratic prin- 
ciples, keeping well informed on the questions and issues of the day and doing 
all in his power to advance the interests of his party in this community. 

With the exception of two and a half years spent in Minnesota Mr. 
Traptow has passed his entire life in Lake county and is well known as a 
leading and influential citizen here, whose worth is widely acknowledged in 
public affairs and in private life. 

FESTUS P. SUTTON. 

Festus P. Sutton is a prominent and well known agriculturist in West 
Creek township, where he has a nice homestead of one hundred and twenty 
acres. He is the oldest child of one of the most prominent and worthy fam- 
ilies in the western portion of Lake county, a family which has always been 




"Ttt^n^i TT fjil.>^XX^i 







Crt-^l^. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 409 

recognized for its integrity and the personal excellence of its individual 
members. The Snttons are of English origin, and those of the name have 
the advantage of a well knit and wholesome ancestry, with reputation 
throughout for substantiality and solidit3^ 

Mr. Sutton was born in Rush county. Indiana. October 9, 1846. There 
were eight children in the family, four sons and four daughters, seven of 
whom are living, and more detailed mention is made of them in the history 
of Mr. Otto Sutton to be found elsewhere in this \'olume. The parents were 
Gabriel F. and Almeda THall) Sutton. The father was a man who stood 
four-square to the world, and is one of the most worthy characters that 
figure in the history of Lake county. He was an exemplary citizen, and set 
a good example to his children and family, who in turn have honored him. 
He began life as a poor man in Rush county of this state, and when he died 
a few years ago in Lake county he was reckoned as a man of affluence, and 
left a fine property to his children, besides the rich heritage of his own name. 
He was a lover of relics and antiquities, and had in his possession many 
articles and papers connected with the earlier history of the Sutton family. 
His aged widow is still living a contented and peaceful life on the old home- 
stead not far from her children. 

Mr. Festus Sutton was reared in his native county of Rush until he was 
about fifteen or sixteen years old, and since then he has been a resident of 
Lake county. He !iad already gained most of his education before coming 
to Lake county, but also here continued his schooling for a time in the public 
institutions of learning of the county. Self-application has been the ground 
for most of his success in life, and in his life work of farming he has made 
a very creditable success. He has also been engaged for the past thirty 
years in grain-threshing in northwest Indiana, and is one of the best known 
men in this part of the state in this line of industr}'. 

Mr. Sutton lived at home with his parents until he was over forty years 
old. On June 20. 18S9. he was united in marriage with Miss Altie L. Cover, 
and since then they have resided on their pleasant and profitable homestead 
in West Creek township. Mrs. Sutton was born in Belmont county, Ohio. 
June 28, 1868, being a daughter of George N. and Harriett (Jarvis) Cover. 
When she was four years old she came to Jasper county, Indiana, where she 



410 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

was reared and received her education in the public schools. She is very 
fond of good literature as of all other things that enhance the beauty, coin- 
fort and pleasure of home. Mr. and Mrs. Sutton have one daughter, Altie 
Almeda. 

Mrs. Sutton's father still lives in Jasper county, where he is a well 
known farmer. She was one of eleven children, five sons and six daughters,, 
and in this family there were four pairs of twins. Ten of these children are 
living-, and ]\Irs. Sutton is the only one in Lake county; two are residents 
of Oklahoma, and the rest of Jasper county. The following is the obituary 
of Mrs. Sutton's mother : 

Harriett (Jarvis) Cover was born in Noble county. Ohio. June 25, 1839; 
died at her home in Union township, Jasper county, Indiana, January 10, 
1890, aged fifty years, six months, and sixteen days. ]\Ioved with her parents 
when three years old. to Belmont county. Ohio, and was there married to 
George N. Cover, December 15, 1859. She was the mother of eleven chil- 
dren, six girls and five boys, all of whom survive her. Among these eleven 
children are four pairs of twins. She was a teacher in the public schools for 
eleven terms, and a teacher and worker in the Sunday schools for many years. 
She joined the Christian church in 1853 and was a faithful and zealous 
member until the end. Her husband and all her children were present at 
the funeral, and also Mrs. Sarah E. Johnson, a sister, from Belmont county, 
Ohio. The funeral was held Sunday, January 12, and was conducted by 
Elder E. D. Pierson. The interment was in Prater graveyard. 

The sorrowing husband and children desire to express, through these 

columns, their smcere thanks to the many friends for aid and sympathy in 

iheir affliction. 

"A precious one from us has gone, 

A voice we loved is stilled; 
A place is vacant in our home, 

W^hich never can be filled. 
God in His wisdom has recalled 

The boon His love had given ; 
And though the body moulders here, 

The soul is safe in heaven.'' 

Mr. Sutton cast his first vote for General Grant, and as far as consistent 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 411 

witli Iiis personal activity has never failed to support with enthusiasm the 
principles of the Grand Old Party. He has been selected as a delegate to 
the district and county conventions at various times. Fraternally he is a 
member of the Knights of Pythias. Lodge No. 300, at Lowell, and Mrs. 
Sutton is a charter member of the Rathbone Sisters at the same place. Mr. 
and Airs. Sutton are both adherents of the Christian church, and contribute 
according to their means to the benevolences. 



'& 



FREDERICK H. EINSPAHR. 

Frederick H. Einspahr, of \\'est Creek township, is an enterprising, 
energetic, public-spirited agriculturist and citizen, and his career and achieve- 
ments in every department of life are an honor and credit to his county. 
Lake county as much as any comity in the state is indebted to the fine class 
of German-Americans who have taken up their abode within its boundaries 
and. devoted themselves to the development of its interests. Wherever this 
class of citizens have settled there one may look for the highest degree of 
agricultural enterprise, as would be apparent to even a casual observer or 
traveler in Lake county. As a rule these settlers came to America poor but 
honest and industrious, and these qualities of character pro^•el to be among 
the most important factors in the improvement of the great west and also 
resulted in individual prosperity and influence. As a class they also believe 
in the education of their children and the training of them in proper habits 
of living and morality, so that all institutions of society have profited and 
been elevated by the coming of the men of the Teutonic race. 

Mr. Einspahr was born in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, August 25, 
1852, a son of Frederick and Anna Kathrine (Claussen) Einspahr. He 
was the fourth of their seven children, five sons and two daughters, and five 
are yet living : Lizzie, who is the wife of Jacob Buehler, a farmer of Ode- 
bolt, Iowa; Anna, wife of Adolph Kuehl, a prosperous farmer at Crown 
Point; Mr. Einspahr; Martin, married and a farmer of ^\'est Creek town- 
ship; and John E., who is married and is a wagon-maker at Odebolt, Iowa. 

Frederick Einspahr, the father, was born in the same part of the fatb.er- 
land as his son, on ]\Iarch 13, 1816, and died October 29, 1875. He was a 
tailor by trade. He was educated in the German language, and was a man 
of more than ordinary intelligence. As a journeyman tailor he traveled 



412 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tliroughout ("lerniany. and cimtinued that business in his nati\e land for a 
number of years. He finally concluded to leave his fatherland and find in 
America a place for his family and better opportunities for gaining a for- 
tune. In the spring of 1853 he embarked his little family on a sailing vessel 
at Hamljurg and thence by way of England crossed the Atlantic and after 
a long voyage of ninety days landed in Quebec. Canada, being there amid 
a strange people and in a foreign land. Blue Island, Illinois, was their first 
permanent destination, and the father remained there some years, following 
his trade in the winter and farming in the summer. In 1867 he brought his 
family to West Creek township and purchased eighty-five acres of land. The 
little log cabin which ser\-ed as their bumble habitation for the first few years 
still stands on the farm, as a memorial of the past with its pri\'ations and 
primitive ways. He ^^•ent in debt for his property, but his diligence and 
good management paid for it and also enabled him to buy eighty acres more. 
He was a man of honest and upright character, was a stanch Republican in 
political beliefs, and he and his wife were reared in the faith of the German 
Lutheran church and after coming to Indiana became German Methodists. 

Mr. Einspahr's mother survived her husband for over a quarter of a cen- 
tury, and passed away at the home of her son Fred, February 8, 1903, aged 
eighty-five years eleven months and six days. She was born at Xeuminster, 
Schleswig-Holstein, March 2, 1817. June 7. 1842, she was united in mar- 
riage to Frederick Einspahr, and at her death, besides her own five children, 
there were forty-eight grandchildren and twenty-one great-grandchildren and 
a large circle of relatives and friends to mourn her loss. Funeral services 
were held at the German Methodist church February 10, 1903, Rev. Dis- 
myer conducting the obsequies, after which her remains were laid to rest in 
the cemetery adjoining the church. She had resided in America for nearly 
half a century, and for the last forty-five years had been a faithful member 
of the German Methodist church and always lived a true and Christian life. 
She was always a true and loving mother, a good friend and obliging- 
neighbor. 

Mr. Einspahr was not a year old when the voyage to the new world 
was undertaken, and he was about fourteen or fifteen when he became a resi- 
dent of West Creek township. During his active lifetime he has witnessed 
this beautiful agricultural region improved from a bare prairie or marsh into 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 413 

the most productive part of the county. Within his remembrance the couii- 
tr}- was largely unfenced, and Lowell, now a beautiful town of sixteen hun- 
dred, contained only two stores. Wolves were also plentiful during his boy- 
hood. Every two weeks during the season it was the custom to haul their 
grain to tlie Chicago market, and Fred always accompanied tlie wagon each 
time. ]Mr. Einspahr is a more than ordinarily well educated man, having 
been trained in both the German and English languages. He began earning 
wages at the age of fourteen years, giving the money to his parents. And 
when he started out for himself at the age of twenty-one he had not five 
dollars to his name. He went to Chicago and was a coachman for two years, 
and then in the ice business one year, after which he returned to Lake countv 
and took up his permanent career as a farmer. 

November 17. 1878, he married Miss Dorathea Frederick, and during 
their felicitous marriage union, lasting twenty-two years, nine children were 
born, all of whom are li\ing at the present time, as follows : Christena, 
who finished the eighth grade of school and can read and speak the German 
language, has, since her mother's death, taken full charge of the home, and 
is a young" lady who has many friends and acquaintances throughout the 
township: Peter F., who finished the eighth grade and is a farmer in West 
Creek township, married ]Miss Lottie B. Flayden and has a little daughter, 
Mabel Lucy; Wilhelmina, who is in the eighth grade of school: Frederick 
J., in the eighth grade; Laura, who graduated in 1902 from the grammer 
schools at the age of thirteen: Anna, in the sixth grade: Clara, in the fourth; 
L'vin, in the first; and ]\Iartha, who is the baby of the home. 

The full review of the life of ]Mrs. Einspahr is gi\-en in the following 
published obituar}- ; Dorathea Frederick was born near Blue Island, Illinois. 
August 17, 1859, and died at her home in ^^'■est Creek township after a 
brief illness, December 17, 1900, at the age of forty-one years and four 
months. In infancy she came with her parents from Blue Islanrl to Dyer, 
Indiana. November 17, 1878, she \\as united in marriage to Frederick 
Einspahr. To this union nine children, three boys and six girls, were born; 
all of which sur\-i\-e their mother, their dearest and truest friend on earth. 
At the age of fifteen years she joined the Lutheran church, and ever lived the 
life of the true Christian ; being ever ready to assist in any good work, ever 
thinking more of the happiness of others than of her own. She was a true 



4U HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

and faithful wife; a kind and indulgent mother and an obliging neighlx)r, 
and will be greatly missed and sincerely mourned bj^ the whole community 
in which she lived. The seventeenth day of the month seemed to be the day 
upon which the epochs in her life were to occur, for upon that day of the 
month she was born, married and died : rather a strange fatality. She leaves 
her husband, nine children, two brothers : John Frederick, of D}-er, Indiana, 
and Peter Frederick, of Lowell, Indiana ; and four sisters : Mrs. Joseph Sons, 
of Dyer, Indiana, Mrs. John Harms, of Dalton, Illinois, Mrs. Albert Ger- 
ritsen, of Fernwood, Illinois, and Mrs. William Einspahr, of West Creek, 
Indiana; an aged mother-in-law, together with a large circle of friends, to 
mourn the departure of a true, noble and loving wife, mother and friend, 
to that higher sphere of life. Her funeral occurred from the German ■Metho- 
dist church in \\'est Creek township, Thursday, December 20, at 2 p. m. 
Rev. Dismyer, of Crown Point, preached the funeral discourse. She was 
laid away in the cemetery near the church, there to rest in cjuiet slumber 
until the morning of the first resurrection, then to come forth into immortal 
life to enjoy the companionship of the dear friends she has left Iiehind 
throughout an endless eternity. To the sorely berea\-ed family the Tribune 
extends its sincere sympathy. 

Mr. and Mrs. Einspahr began on the old homestead, which he had 
purchased from the other heirs. He went in debt, but by industry and honest 
toil and careful economy cleared off all incumbrances and gained a com- 
fortable and valuable estate. His farm of eighty-fi\-e acres lies in. \\'est 
Creek township, and he is looked upon as one of the most progressive farmers 
of the community. By his upright life 1:)efore God and man he has won 
the respect and confidence of all who know him, and can bear his part with 
dignity and honor wherever he goes. As a Republican voter he cast his 
first ballot for R. B. Hayes. He has represented his township in the county 
conventions of the party at various times. He has been road superintendent 
time and again for twenty years. He fraternizes with Council No. 13 of the 
Order of Foresters at Lowell, and he and the family attend the German 

Methodist church. 

JAMES J. KELSEY. 

The pioneers of the country, those who blazed the way to civilization 
and made the wilderness to bloom and blossom like the rose, are as a class 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 415 

rapitlly passing a\Yay, and it is a pleasure to be able to record while some 
of them are yet living their achievements and their place in society and the 
world. Mr. Kelsey is one of this worthy class of citizens in northwestern 
Indiana, and has passed many years in this vicinity and in eastern Illinois. 

He was born in Tioga county, Pennsyhania, February 25, 1842, and 
is the second of the three children, being the only son, of John D. and 
Eunice (Johnson) Kelsey. His sister Mary is still living, being the widow 
of Otis Townsend and a resident of Duluth, Minnesota. John D. Kelsey was 
born in Vermont about 1809, and died in 1876. He was a farmer by occupa- 
tion He was reared to young manhood in Vermont, thence nio\"ed to Penn- 
sylvania, some years later to New York, and then to Lake county, Lidiana, 
where he passed away. He had enjoyed a common school education in his 
youth, and was a man of superior intelligence and capability. In politics 
he was a Whig and then a stalwart Republican, with pronounced anti-slavery 
sentiments. Fraternally he was a member of the Independent Order of Odd 
Fellows, and he and his wife were members of the Christian church. His 
remains are Imried in the L(.iwell cemetery. 

Mr. Kelsey lost his mother when he was three years of age, and it was 
about the same time when the family moved to New York state, where he 
was reared to the age of eighteen. Part of his education was obtained in an 
old-fashioned hewn-log cabin school with slab seats resting on four wooden 
pins, and with the desk for the big boys and girls a broad board running part 
way round the room and resting on pins driven into the wall. The room was 
heated by a box stove, for which the big boys by turn cut the wood used as 
fuel. His pen was a goosequill, and he conned his lessons from Davies 
arithmetic, the Rhetorical reader, and the Sanders speller, and the school 
was supported on the subscription plan. From these facts it will be seen 
what a change has been wrought in educational matters since Mr. Kelsey's 
youth. 

Mr. Kelsey began life at the bottom of the ladder. He worked out at 
nine dollars per month in order to earn money with which to liring his par- 
ents to Indiana. And when they arrived at Cedar Lake in this county they 
had twenty dollars only. He began working at wages as low as fifty cents 
a day, from which it is seen that he has made great progress in this county. 
His father rented a farm in West Creek township in the spring of i860, and 



416 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

the son began witli liiin and remained tliere two years, and then his father 
gave him his time. He did not liave enough to buy his winter clothing, and 
he began to earn wages by chopping wood. From Lake county he went to 
Momence, Illinois, where he found employment in a distillery, and then hired 
out to a farmer at thirteen dollars a month. This continued until August. 
1862. at which date he joined Company K, One Hundred and Thirteenth 
Illinois Infantry, and was in ser\-ice as a part of the Army of the Tennessee 
until February, 1863. Part of the time he served as guard for the provision 
train, and for about a month was in the hospital at Keokuk, Iowa. On re- 
ceiving his honorable discharge he returned home and resumed his farming 
operations. 

September 18, 1863, 'i^ married Miss Nancy J. Kile, and their three 
children, two sons and one daughter, are all living, as follows : Laura E. 
is the wife of A. B. Chipman, whose history is given elsewhere in this 
volume. Merritt, the elder son, is the popular liveryman at Lowell, where 
he has a splendid business and a pretty home; by his wife, Catherine Stubbs, 
he has two daughters, Vernal Nancy, in the seventh grade of the public 
schools, and Ethel Pauline. Leroy Elkin, the younger son, is a machinist, 
residing in Lowell, and he married Miss Mary Ponto, by whom there is a 
son. Cecil Glenn. 

Mrs. Kelsey was born in Yellowhead township, Kankakee county, 
Illinois, January 3, 1842, being a daughter of Reason C. and Nancy Jane 
(Hayden) Kile, and she was reared and educated in that county. She is a 
kind and loving wife and mother and has always stood by her husband in 
liis life work. The first land that they purchased was one hundred and forty 
acres in Yellowhead township, and Mr. Kelsey went in debt for it. Init with 
characteristic energy and with the aid of his good wife and children paid 
off every dollar. And to that original tract he has subsequently added, first 
one hundred and twenty acres, and then one hundred and eighty-two acres, 
all of which lies in Yellowhead township, and the improvements on the old 
homestead are of the very best. This is an admirable record for a man who 
began life without twenty dollars to his name, and he has prospered de- 
servedly. At one time he was paying as high as sixteen per cent interest on 
his indebtedness. 

Mr. Kelsey and his wife came to Lowell in 1899 and purchased a pretty 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 417 

and comfortable residence where they are li\ing a retired hfe. He is a Re- 
publican in politics, and cast his lirst vote for the Rail-Splitter President 
Abe Lincoln, since which time he has always supported that party's prin- 
ciples. For twelve years he served as a public school director in Kankakee 
county. Fraternally lie is a member of Burnham Post No. 226. G. A. R. He 
and his wife are kind, lining people, respecters of Christianity, and have 
many friends in Lowell and in Kankakee county. 

The following paragraphs, which appeared in the local jiress. indicate 
further facts anent the life and character of ]Mrs. Kelsey's parents : 

Reason C. Kile died at his home one and one-half miles northeast of 
Sherbnrnville. on Friday, February 10. 1899. The funeral was held at the 
residence on Sunday, and interment took place at \\'est Creek. Mr. Kile 
was born August 10, 1S17, in Knox county, Ohio. He came to Kankakee 
county in 1837, and located on section 36. Yellowhead township, where he 
cleared a farm, and remained there about seven years. He then remo\'ed 
to the location wdiich was his home when he died. He -was married in 1840 
to Miss Nancy Hayden, daughter of Nehemiah Hayden, one of the pioneer 
settlers of Lake county, Lidiana. Five children came from this union, three 
of whom are still living — Nancy, wife of James J. Kelsey; Mary Ellen, wife 
of George W. VanAlstine; and Flora, wife of William Hatton. Mr. Kile 
commenced for himself without anything, but through industry and economy 
has accjuired a competency. 

Mrs. Nancy Jane Kile died at her home in Yellowhead township, Kan- 
kakee county, Illinois, last Sunday morning, after a prolonged illness of 
about four years, her malady being in the form of a gradual decline, but for 
the past four weeks before her death she was confined to her bed and was 
as helpless as a babe. The best of care and attention was bestowed upon 
her by relatives and friends during her long period as an invalid. The fun- 
eral services were held from the \\'est Creek Methodist church Mondav fore- 
noon at 10 o'clock, at which services a very large concourse of relatives and 
friends were in attendance, and the expressions of sorrow and sympathy 
were sincere and heartfelt for the bereaved. The services were conducted 
by Elder John Bruce. The remains were laid to rest in the West Creek 
cemetery. Funeral Director Clifford Stowell conducting this part of the 



b 



418 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

service. Edgar, Jake, Lute. John. Cyrus and William Hayden, brothers of 
the deceased, acted as pall-bearers. 

Nancy Jane Hayden was born in the state of Pennsylvania, April 27, 
1823, and when but a child her parents, Nehemiah and Harriet Hayden, 
moved to Knox county, Ohio, where she spent her early childhood. In 
1836 she came with her parents to Lake county, Indiana, they being among 
the first pioneer settlers of this county. She was united in marriage 
to Reason C. Kile. To this union five children were born, three of whom 
are living, namely: Nancy, wife of James Kelsey, Mary E., wife of George 
VanAlstine, and Flora, wife of A\'illiam Hatton. After her marriage to 
Mr. Kile in 1841 they settled on the farm near Sherburnville, which has 
been the home of the deceased until death, preceded by a long and severe ill- 
ness, took her away on October 19, 1902, at the age of 79 years, 5 months 
and 22 days. Mrs. Kile was well known and highly esteemed by all. Her 
many relatives and friends mourn her loss. 

CHARLES A. BORGER. 

Prominent and influential in the business and public life of Hobart. 
Charles A. Borger is now engaged in the manufacture of harness there, and 
is also a member of the town board, and while successfully conducting his 
private business affairs he is at the same time ably assisting in getting com- 
miuiity interests which affect the entire town. His wide acquaintance and the 
esteem in which he is uniformly held renders it imperative that his life his- 
tory be given a place in this volume. 

He was born in Hanover township. Lake county, October 5, i860, and 
is a son of John and Metta (Meyer) Borger, the former born in Hanover. 
Germany, and the latter in Bremen. Germany. It was after their emigra- 
tion to the new world that they were married, the wedding ceremony being 
performed in Lake county. They then took up their al»de in Flanover town- 
ship, and the father carried on agricultural pursuits until his life's labors 
Avere ended in death, when he was but fifty-six years of age. He had been 
a resident of the county since 1842 and during the greater part of that period 
was a factor in agricultural circles. His wife died when but fifty-four years 
■of age. They were the parents of nine children, all born in Lake county. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 419 

and eight of tlie number are still living, Mr. C. A. Borger being the fourth 
son and fifth child. 

Upon the home farm in Hano\er township, Charles A. Borger spent the 
davs of his boyhood, remaining with his mother until nineteen years of age, 
when he entered upon an apprenticeship to the harness-maker's trade in 
Dyer, Indiana. He served for a term of fiiur years and then went to Chi- 
cago, where he worked for one year. On the expiration of that period he 
came to Hobart in 1885 and here began the manufacture of harness. He 
received a little aid from his parents in the beginning of his business career. 
In 1893 ^"1^ bnilt his present place of business, which is a two-story brick 
structure, in which he is now conducting one of the leading productive in- 
dustries of the city. He has secured a lilieral patronage, owing to the ex- 
cellence of the goods which he manufactures and to his honorable treatment 
of his patrons. 

]\Ir. Borger was married in October, 1885. the lady of his choice being 
Miss Henrietta Batterman, who was born January 3, 1864, in Will county, 
Illinois, being a sister of E. Batterman, who is represented elsewhere in this 
work. They are the parents of two daughters. Sena and Edna. Sena was 
born July 3. 1886: she graduated in the class of 1903 in the Hobart township 
high school, and is now one of Lake county's successful teachers, at Miller's 
Station. Edna was born INIarch 15, 1893, ''"'^' is in the sixth grade of the 
Hobart schools. Mr. Borger exercises his right of franchise in support of 
the men and measures of the Republican part^• and has firm faith in its prin- 
ciples and in their ultimate triumph. He is now a member of the town board. 
Fraternally he is connected with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, 
^'o. 33,.^- with the Knights of Pythias Lodge, No. 458, and with the Knights 
of the Maccabees, Tent No. 65, and also a member of the ^Masonic fraternity, 
^"o. 357. He enjoys the warm esteem of his brethren of these orders, for he 
is true to their teaching and the beneficent principles upon v.'hich they are 
founded. He has in his business career made consecutive progress, and his 
course has been marked by desirable accomplishment, but when he started 
out in life for himself he possessed little capital, nor did he recei\'e any ad- 
vantages from influential family connection. He has worked ;)ersistently and 
has gained prosperity as the result of earnest labor, in wdiich keen discrimina- 
tion and sound business judgment have formed a part. 



420 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

MRS. K.VTHARINA EINSPAHR. 

The women of a community are ofttimes the most enterprising factors 
in its activity, and extend their influence far beyond their supposedly legiti- 
mate sphere of work. There is no citizen of West Creek township more 
highly esteemed for enterprise and worth in the business and industrial de- 
partments of Lake county as well as for large qualities of heart and mind, 
than Mrs. Einspahr, who resides on the fine estate in this township which 
she and her husband by indefatigable labor and honest industry and wise 
management built up to extensive and valuable proportions. 

This worthy representative of the ladies of West Creek township was 
born in Hesse-Darmstadt. Germany. June 26, 1852, being the eldest of three 
children, all daughters, and her two sisters being : Christine, wife of George 
W^alker, a retired resident of Chicago, and who has one child : and Mary, 
wife of James Nott, engaged in real estate business in Chicago. The par- 
ents of these three daughters were T. Baldanzer and Maggie (Albus) Frank. 
Her father was born in Frankfort on the Rhine in 1823, and died in 1887. 
He was educated in the German tongue, and followed farming throughout 
life. Li 1857 he set sail from Germany with his family, the port of departure 
being Bremen, and, on account of the heavy storms which the sailing vessel 
encountered, they were three months and nine days in reaching this side of 
the Atlantic. He at once brought the family out to Blue Island, Illinois, 
W'here he began his active career as a farmer, poor but honest, and at his 
death could say that he had always made his own way and had enjoyed the 
high regard of his neighbors and friends. For a time he was a watchman 
in the Union Depot at Chicago, and he died in that city. He was a Republi- 
can in politics, and he and his wife were members of the Lutheran church. 
His wife was born in Nassau, Germany, in 1817, and died in 1895, having 
lived, after her husband's death, with her daughter. 

September 20, 1871, Miss Katharina Frank was married to Mr. August 
Einspahr, and the ten children born of this union are all living at the present 
writing, as follows : Fred, who is a farmer of Odebolt, Iowa, and is mar- 
ried : \\'illiam, a prosperous farmer of West Creek township, and a married 
man; August, a farmer of the same township; Maggie, wife of Otto Sutton, 
one of the prosperous men of West Creek township whose histories appear 
in this volume ; Martin, who resides with his mother and conducts the farm ; 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUxXTY. 4:^1 

Emil, wlio is a farmer of the same township; Emma, wife of Joseph Carl, 
who is in a grcenhonse at Crown Point ; Walker, a farmer of \\'est Creek 
township: Alfred, who makes his home with his mother; and Katie, the 
youngest, who is in the sixth grade of school. 

Mr. Einspahr was horn in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, May 2, 1S43. 
and died February 11, 1894. He was ten years old when he accompanied 
his parents to America, their residence from the first being at Blue Island. 
Illinois. He was thus trained and educated in both the German and Eng- 
lish languages. His parents were Frederick and Anna K. Einspahr. both 
deceased. Mr. Einspahr gave almost a year of loyal service as a soldier 
to the Union during the Civil war. and then received his honorable discharge. 
After his marriage he and his wife began life on eighty acres of land in \\^est 
Creek township, the property being incumbered with twenty-two hundred 
dollars' debt. But they were indtistrious, shrewd managers, and had early 
learned the lesson of making both ends meet, so that it was not long before 
the indebtedness was cleared off and they were free to add more to their 
estate. 

Mr. Einsphar was a stanch Republican, and all his sons follow his ex- 
ample. He was a solid man. reliable and of unflinching integrity, and all 
men respected him for his sterling worth. He and his wife were both mem- 
bers of the German Methodist church. Since her husband's death Mrs. Ein- 
spahr has erected her comfortable residence in the township, and has super- 
vised the placing of the many improvements and the tiling of the land. She 
is a lady who is held in tlie highest esteem liy all her acquaintances, and her 
hospitable home is a place of rest and comfort for all who entei'' therein. 

HENRY' BRANDT. 

Henry Brandt, the prosperous and well known farmer and stockman of 
West Creek township, belongs to that fine class of German-American citizens 
who have been such praiseworthy factors in the upbuilding" of the material and 
intellectual resources of Lake county. He is a native son and a life-long 
resident of the county, and therefore his interest in the county is deep-rooted 
and sincere. The history of his career shows that he has accomplished a 
more than ordinary success, and it may be said that in ever}- relation of life 
he has merited the esteem of his fellow citizens. 



422 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Brandt was born in Lake county, April 2, 1856, and is the fifth in 
a family of nine children, four sons and five daughters, born to Dietrich and 
Anna (Bischop) Brandt. Eight of this family of sons and daughters are 
still living, as follows : John, who is a farmer of Benton county, Iowa ; 
Mary, wife of David Locker, a fanner of Greeley county, Nebraska ; Will- 
iam, a farmer of Lyon county, Iowa, and married ; Henry ; Anna, wife of 
George Sautter, a Nebraska farmer; Lena, wife of William Bahr, a farmer 
of Lyon county, Iowa : Emma, wife of Casper Gross, a tile manufacturer of 
Benton county, Iowa ; and Herman, a farmer of Lyon county, Iowa. 

Dietrich Brandt, the father of these children, was born near the free 
city of Bremen, in Hanover, Germany, was educated in the German lan- 
guage, and followed farming pursuits throughout the active part of his life. 
He was married in Germany, and three of their children were born in the 
fatherland. About the year 1848 he decided to come to America to seek his 
fortune, and he accordingly embarked his own on board a sailing vessel at 
Bremen, and after thirty-six days arrived in New York. He came out to 
Lake county, thus being among the early settlers, and purchased one hun- 
dred and sixty acres of rather wild land. The first home was a log cabin, 
and the hazel bushes were standing thick around and over the present highly 
cultivated place. He w-as a successful man in his work, and besides provid- 
ing well for his family he accumulated two hundred and ninety acres in West 
Creek township, his estate containing some of the choicest land in the com- 
munity. He was a Republican in politics, and he and his wife were members 
of the Evangelical church in West Creek township, he having assisted in 
the building of the church edifice. His death occurred about 1880, and his 
wife, who was also born in the vicinity of Bremen, passed away in 1893. 

Mr. Henry Brandt received an education in the English public schools 
of West Creek township, and from his earliest years of active labor to the 
present time has been identified successfully with farming and stock-raising 
pursuits. He remained at home with his parents until he had reached his 
majority, and when he started out independently he was possessed of a capi- 
tal of fifteen hundred dollars. 

January 18, 1882, he married ^liss Emma Sastrow, and of this happy 
marriage eight children have been born, seven of whom are H\ing. Ernest, 
the eldest, received his diploma for completion of the common school course 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 423 

in 1900, and is at lionie; Elsie, a graduate of tlie class of 1902, has also 
taken music: George is a graduate in 1903; Dora is in the fifth grade; and 
Harry, the youngest, is in the second grade of school. Mrs. Brandt was 
born in Cook county, Illinois, June 28, i860, being a daughter of Charles 
and Henrietta ( Steiner) Sastrow. She has one sister, Carrie, wife of Will- 
iam Brandt. Her parents came from Prussia, her father being a native of 
Pomerania and her mother of Holstein. and her father is still living, being 
a resident of Lyon county, Iowa. 

After their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Brandt settled on a farm of one 
hundred and sixty acres within half a mile of their present homestead. They 
have been thrifty and good managers, and as the years have gone by their 
prosperity has manifested itself by an accumulated estate of three hundred 
and ninety-nine acres, all finely cultivated and as good land as lies within the 
confines of West Creek township. They also own three hundred and twenty 
acres in South Dakota, near Salem, the county seat of McCook county. Mr. 
Brandt is a good judge of fine stock, and keeps good grades of Norman 
horses, Durham cattle and Chester White hogs. He has the best of improve- 
ments on the farm, consisting of large and commodious barns, granaries and 
other outbuildings, and in 1896 he erected a comfortable country residence 
which is a credit to the community. He is a Republican in politics, and, 
from the time of casting his first presidential vote for James A. Garfield, he 
has been a loyal upholder of Republican principles. Fraternally he is a mem- 
ber of Lodge No. 14. of the Independent Order of Foresters at Brunswick. 

Indiana. 

LOUIS LARSON. 

Louis Larson is a prominent and enter]M"ising farmer of Lake county, 
residing on section 17. Ross township, where he has a well improved property 
that in its beautiful appearance indicates his careful supervision. A native 
of Sweden, he was born on the 20th of November, i860, and was a son of 
John Larson, who was also born in that country, whence he came to America, 
landing in New York in 1866, and then spent two years in Chicago. Two 
years afterward he came to Lake county, Indiana, establishing his home in 
Hobart township in 1868. There he remained for seven years and then 
removed to Ross township, but later he returned to Hobart township, where 
his death occurred in 1898, when he was in his sixty-sixth year. He was a 
life-long Republican, having firm faith in the principles of the party and 



424 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

giving to it his stalwart support. Both he and his wife are members of the 
Swedish Lutheran church at Hobart, and he was deeply interested in all that 
pertained to the moral and educational advancement as well as to the material 
upbuilding of his community. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Ellen 
Olson, is also a native of Sweden. She still survives her husband and now 
makes her home with her son Louis. She has been twice married, and by the 
first union she had two daughters, while the children of the second marriage 
are two sons. 

Louis Larson, the younger son, was but five years of age when his 
parents left Sweden and came to the new world, while since seven years of 
age he has made his home in Lake county. Indiana. Here he was reared and 
educated, attending the Hobart schools and also the Ainsworth school in 
Ross township. To his father he gave the benefit of his services through 
the period of his minority, working in the fields throughout the summer 
months or from the time of early spring planting until crops were har- 
vested in the late autumn. He remained at home to the time of his mar- 
riage, which occurred on the 3d of January, 1885. the lady of his choice 
being Miss Hilda Strom, a native of Sweden, who came to the United States 
when fourteen years of age. To Mr. and Mrs. Larson have been born three 
children : William, Edwin and Herbert. 

After his marriage Mr. Larson rented his father's farm for about four 
years and then purchased the place upon which he has since carried on 
general agricultural pursuits and stock-raising. He now has eighty acres 
of good land here, well improved with substantial buildings. There is a 
comfortable house and large bam, and other modern improvements which 
indicate the owner to be a man of progressive and practical spirit. His land 
is arable, and the well-tilled fields yield to him a good return for his labor. 
In his political views he is a stanch Republican, and his religious faith is 
indicated by his membership in the Swedish Methodist Episcopal church at 
Hobart. Almost his entire life has been passed in Lake county, and those 
who have known him from boyhood esteem him highly because his life has 
been honorable and upright. 

THOMAS GRANT. 

Thomas Grant, numbered among the wide-awake and progressive busi- 
ness men of Lake county, Indiana, is now engaged in merchandising in 




/.^^n^^^T^yi^^^--^^ 




HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 425 

Lowell and is also filling the position of township trustee, heing active and in- 
fluential in community affairs. He was born in Lowell on the 13th of Sep- 
tember. 1865, and is a son of Thomas Grant, who was born in Scotland and 
came to America when a yotmg man, locating in Chicago. Subseciuently 
he removed to this county, settling in Lriwell in 186(3. He assisted in build- 
ing the mill here, but his business career was early terminated by death. 
He died in the south when his son Thomas was but nine months old. 

Thomas Grant was early thrown upon his own resources, for when a 
youth of only nine years he began working by the month as a farm hand. 
He also worked as a section hand for three years on the Monon Railroad, 
after which he learned, the carpenter's trade and followed that pursuit for ten 
years. As time pass"ed he prospered in his undertaking because of his 
economy and diligence, and on retiring from active connection with carpen- 
tering he invested the capital he had acquired in a mercantile enterprise in 
Lowell, becoming a partner of his brother Jarnes. This business connec- 
tion was formed in 1900, and they now carry a large and well selected line of 
general merchandise. Mr. Grant of this review is also a stockholder in the 
Lowell National Bank and his efforts are an important factor in promoting 
commercial activity and prosperity in his town. 

In 1893 Mr. Grant was united in marriage to Miss Gracie Nichols, a 
daughter of W. C. and Mary Nichols. They have one son, Byrl. Mr. Grant 
is a stanch Republican, taking an acti^•e interest in the work .-uul success of 
his party, and in 1900 he was elected township trustee, which position he 
is now filling. Fraternally he is connected with the Knights of Pythias 
lodge No. 300, at Lowell, and with the Masonic order. Having spent his 
entire life in Lowell he is well known in this portion of the county, and his 
life history is as an open book wdiich all may read. His friends entertain 
for liim warm regard, for he has ever commanded their respect and confi- 
dence, and because of his prominence in public and business affairs he well 
deserves mention as one of the representative citizens of this pari of the state. 

ALBERT FOSTER. 

Albert Foster, ex-trustee of West Creek township, for many years 
actively engaged in agricultural affairs and now a resident of Lowell, belongs 
to the well-known Foster family which for two-thirds of a century have 



426 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

been conspicuous in the development of the county's material resources. 
The landed possessions in the Foster name are among the largest single 
estates in the county. Besides being accumulators of property, they have 
been producers of wealth, and from the time of the father who located here 
during the pioneer days the influence and works of the family members have 
alwaj's been on the side of progress in social, intellectual and institutional 
affairs. What has been accomplished by this family will always remain 
as a test and mark of their merit and worth as citizens, and Mr. Albert 
Foster has not been one of the least of the name in conferring great good 
upon the county of his nativity. 

Mr. Foster was born in W^est Creek 'township on Christmas day of 
1856. His parents were George L. and Lucy Jane (Hathaway) Foster, 
and he was the fifth of their ten children, five sons and five daughters, nine 
of whom are still living, as follows : Edwin L., who is married and engaged 
in the oil business at Jacksonville, Illinois ; Volney, married and a farmer 
in prosperous circumstances in West Creek township; Edson, married and a 
resident of Chicago Heights, Illinois; Albert; Eliza, wife of Arthur Farley, 
a farmer of Lowell; Emeline, wife of F. E. Nelson, the banker at Lowell; 
Martha, wife of Frank L. Smart, who is principal of the Dubuque, Iowa, 
high school, and who was educated at Valparaiso and in Harvard College; 
Mariilia, wife of S. A. Richards, of Valparaiso; and Julia, wife of George 
Bailey. 

George L. Foster was born in Bedford county, Pennsylvania, April 10, 
1 82 1, and died in Kansas, May 12, 1877. He was a farmer and stockman 
and for some time was a cattle drover. He was a self-educated man, gifted 
with a retentive memory, and had great individuality and force of charac- 
ter. His active career began at the early age of fifteen, when he left his 
father's home and went to work on the Erie canal. He came home at the 
end of nine months and gave bis parents, in addition to his regular wages, 
twenty dollars that he had picked up as extras. His father returned to him 
this twenty dollars, and thus capitalized he started out on foot for the distant 
destination of Lalve county, Indiana. When he arrived in this county, in 
1836 or 't,", he had eleven dollars in cash, so that he began at the foot of 
life's ladder. For ten years he was a wage earner. About 1841 he entered 
a tract of eighty acres in section 7, West Creek township, consisting of pure 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 427 

virgin soil, and liis first domicilium was a log cabin, the material for which 
was cut from the Kankakee swamp trees. Not to enter into details, he pros- 
pered to the extent that he owned over one thousand acres of land in this 
count}-, all in one body, besides eleven hundred acres in Kansas. This land 
has never passed from the family, and the descendants instead of selling 
any of it have added much more to it. 

Mr. George L. Foster was a very remarkable man in many ways, and he 
was uniformly successful in all his undertakings. During the California 
gold excitement he started for the Eldorado, but got only as far as Pike's 
Peak. Later, howe^•er, he went on to the coast, returning" by way of the 
Isthmus. Politically he was an old-line Whig and then joined the Re- 
publican party at its birth, being a warm admirer of Abe Lincoln. In official 
capacities he served as county commissioner of Lake county during the war, 
1861-65, and was a strong supporter of the Union. He had a decision of 
character and a firmness that elevated him above the rank and file and gave 
a distinctive stamp to both word and action. He and his wife were both 
members of the Methodist Episcopal church, and he assisted in the erection 
of both houses of worship of that denomination in West Creek township, 
the last one being built in 1867. His wife, Lucy (Hathaway) Foster, was 
born in the Hudson river valley of New York, April 20, 1828, and she died 
November 30, 1876. Both the Foster and Hathaway families were of pure 
English stock, and grandfather EHjah Dwight Foster was one of the famous 
minute-men of the Revolution. 

Albert Foster was reared in western Lake county, and his early educa- 
tion stopped with the common schools, after which he trained himself .mainly 
by personal application. He was only twelve years old when he left the 
parent nest and tried his young wings in independent flight. He was im- 
bued with the desire that comes to all vigorous-minded boys, to travel and 
see the world. As he says, when he should have been at home under his 
mother's care, he was far in the west in New Mexico and Arizona, and 
spending two years in the silver mines of Colorado. He later returned and 
had already got quite a start in life by the time he reached his majority and 
was in the mind of settling down in life. 

On December 30, 1877, just after he had passed his twenty-first birth- 
day, he was married to IMiss Mary E. Sponslor. They have been happily 



428 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

wedded for more than twenty-five }-ears, and six children, three sons and 
three danghters, have been born to them. Clyde D., the eldest, graduated in 
the class of 1896 from the Lowell high school, secured his teacher's cer- 
tificate, taught in his home township two years, was principal at Shelby one 
year, principal of the Franklin school at Hammond two years, and then 
entered the literary department of Northwestern University and is still 
carrying on his studies ; he is a niem!)er of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fra- 
ternity and is a member of the Masonic lodge at Lowell ; during the present 
scholastic year of the universit)- he was unanimously elected president of the 
class, which honor conferred on him was graciously yet modestly received. 
Emma Stella graduated in 1901 from the Lowell high school and is now 
taking the teacher's course at the Ypsilanti (Michigan) Normal, being espe- 
ciall}- interested in elocution. Hattie L., a graduate from the high school 
in 1903, is also at Ypsilanti. Artlnn^ Lyman graduated from the Lowell 
high school in 1904 and pursuing normal studies at the Valparaiso College 
is now a teacher in Lake county. Mr. and Mrs. Foster have not spared 
means or efl:ort in giving their children the best of training and educational 
advantages, and they should be congratulated on the excellent results already 
apparent. 

Mrs. Foster was born in Hardin county, Ohio, December 29, 1852, 
and was reared in that state and educated in the ladies' seminary at \Vest 
Geneva. She was a teacher for a number of years in her native state and 
also in Kansas. Her parents, both now deceased, were Jacob and Mar- 
garet (Slonacker) Sponslor, and she has five brothers living. 

For twenty-one years after their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Foster resided 
upon their homestead in West Creek township, where they liave a fine estate 
of three hundred and ten acres, besides some property that Mrs. Foster owns 
in Ohio. In 1898 they moved into Lowell, where they erected one of the 
most pretentious homes of the town, and have been citizens there ever since. 
Their home is finished in hardwood and Georgia pine, is heated by furnace, 
is prettily furnished, and, best of all and its chief charm, is the abode of 
hospitality and a place of welcome for their many friends. 

Mr. Foster has been prominent in civic affairs in his township, and is 
one of the leaders in matters pertaining to the general welfare. He is a 
stalwart Republican, having cast his first vote for Garfield. In August, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 429 

1895, he accepted tlie office of trustee of West Creek township, and during 
the five years and three months of his tenure of this office many of the most 
important puhlit improvements effecting the people and material progress 
were brought about. Me caused the erection of several of the fine modern 
school buildings in the township, which would be a credit to any community, 
and during his official career, also, the West Creek high school was organ- 
ized, and education in general received a most stimulating influence in all 
directions. In 1900 he was appointed by Judge Gillette as drainage commis- 
sioner in Lake county. He has often been selected as delegate to his party's 
county, district and state conventions. Fraternally he affiliates w'ith Colfax 
Lodge No. 378, F. & A. M., and served as worshipful master one }ear. He 
is also a member of the Knights of Pythias, No. 300, at Low^ell, and belongs 
to the uniform rank of that order. 

THOMAS J. STEARNS. 

From an early period in the development of Lake county Thomas J. 
Stearns has resided in this portion of the state and is now living at Lake 
Station. His interest in public affairs has been manifested in active co-oper- 
ation in all movements for the general good and he has long been a witness 
of wdiat has been accomplished in this county as it has emerged from pioneer 
conditions to take its place with the leading counties of the commonwealth. 

Mr. Stearns was born February 28, 1842, upon a farm in Porter county, 
Indiana, about six miles west of Valparaiso. His father, Joseph Stearns, 
was a native of Rhode Island and was reared in New York, wdience he went 
to Porter county, Indiana, about 1838. In 1852 he came to Lake county, 
casting in his lot with the early settlers of Hobart township, where he per- 
formed the arduous task of developing a new farm from wild and unbroken 
land. He served for several terms as trustee of Hobart township and in 
public affairs took an actix'e and helpful part. He w-as also an interested and 
zealous member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and his labors promoted 
the cause of Christianity in his neighborhood. He died when in his seventy- 
ninth year and left behind an untarnished name and a most honorable record. 
His wife, wdio bore the maiden name of Rhoda Wilson, was a native of Ohio 
and was of Irish descent, while Mr. Stearns was of English lineage. She 
was reared in the Buckeye state and lived to be about sixty-nine years of 



430 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

age. To tliem were born tliirteen children, nine of whom reached years of 
maturity, while two are yet living, Thomas J-, and j\Irs. Rhoda Toothel, 
of Hobart. 

Thomas J. Stearns was the next to the youngest in the family, and he 
w-as brought to Lake county, Indiana, when but ten years of age. His edu- 
cation was acquired in the old time district schools, and in the summer months 
he worked at farm labor until he had gained broad and practical knowledge 
concerning every department of agricultural work. He continued at home 
with his parents until 1861, when, feeling that his first duty was to his 
country, he donned the blue uniform and enlisted in the Fourth Indiana 
Battery as a private. He served for three years and one month, and six 
months of that time was spent in a rebel prison. He was first incarcerated 
at Libby and afterw-ard at Belle Isle. He took part in the battles of Shiloh, 
Stone River, Lookout Mountain, Perryville and many other engagements, 
but never received a wound, although he was often in the thickest of the fight. 

After being honorably discharged at Indianapolis. Indiana, Mr. Stearns 
returned to Hobart, Lake county, since which time he has continuously re- 
sided in this part of the state, living a part of the time in Hobart, where he 
was engaged in conducting a hotel and also in the grocery business. He has 
likewise followed farming, and he was a guard in the Northern prison for 
a year. He has manifested energy and enterprise in every work that he has 
undertaken, and he is now engaged in the real estate and insurance business 
at Lake Station. 

In 1864 ^Ir. Stearns was united in marriage to ?^liss Elizabeth 
Crowthers. They became the parents of two children, but Ijotli are now de- 
ceased. In 1871 Mr. Stearns married his present wife, who bore the maiden 
name of Ella Stillwell, and was a native nf New York. Her birth occurred 
in Schoharie county, August 3, 1845, ^"<-l she is a daughter of Smith T. and 
Hannah (Banks) Stillwell. She was nineteen years of age when she came to 
Lake county and here she has since resided. Mr. Stearns has firm faith in 
the principles of the Republican party and is a recognized leader in its local 
ranks. He is now serving as township assessor, and for twelve years he was 
justice of the peace. He is also notary public and has acted in that capacity 
for twelve years. He belongs to Hobart Post, No. 411, G. A. R., and to 
the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. During fifty-one years he has made 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 431 

his home in Lake count}-, so that he is very famihar with its liistorv and has 
been a witness of nearly all of its growth and development. 

CHARLES C. GIBSON. 

Charles C. Gibson, who is acting postmaster of Tollestcn and is pro- 
prietor of the Hotel Gibson, was born in Chicago. September 25, 1835. His 
father, Thomas Gibson, was a native of Columbus, Ohio, and became a resi- 
dent of Chicago in 1834. three years before the incorporation of the city. 
It was then but an embryo village, and the most farsighted could not have 
dreamed of the man'elous development and growth which awaited it. 
Thomas Gibson conducted a hotel on the beach called the Lake House. He 
remained there until 1838. when lie removed to Lake county, Indiana, and 
here again engaged in the hotel business at what was then known as Grass 
Ridge. He was one of the first settlers of that place and kept a stage house, 
for there was no railroad through this part of the country at that time and, 
in fact, few wagon roads had been laid out. 'Sir. Thomas Gibson afterward 
opened a hotel one mile east of where Tolleston now stands, and he there re- 
mained until his death, which occurred in the year 1850. His widow after- 
ward conducted the hotel until i860, when she opened the first iiotel at Tolles- 
ton. In 1879 she sold that property and enjoyed a well merited rest up to 
the time of her death, which occurred in 1900. Mrs. Thomas Gibson bore 
the maiden name of Maria Neil, and was born in Ireland, whence she came 
to the United States as a maiden of thirteen summers. By her marriage 
she had six children, two sons and four daughters, all of whom reached 
mature years. Init onl}- three are now living, the sisters of our subject being 
Mrs. Elizabeth Baird. who resides at Hunnewell. Shelby county, Missouri : 
and Mrs. Julia B. Follette, who is living in Chicago. 

Charles C. Gibson, the eldest of the children and the only one now liv- 
ing, was reared under the parental roof and was but three years old when 
brought by his parents to Lake county. After his father's death he assisted 
his mother in the hotel business and later entered the service of the Pittsburg, 
Fort Wayne & Chicago Railroad Company, with which he was connected 
for about seventeen years. He entered the service as a brakeman and was 
afterward promoted to the position of conductor. He was also for a time 
with the Michigan Central Railroad Company and also with the North- 



432 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

western Railroad Company, and throughout his railroad service proved him- 
self a most capable, efficient and faithful employe. Mr. Gibson is also en- 
gaged in farming, having carried on agricultural pursuits in Lake county 
for about six years or until 1900, when he opened Hotel Gibson, at Tolles- 
ton. He has since conducted this hostelry and has made it one which is 
creditable to the town. He has a thorough and practical training concern- 
ing the best methods of carrying on the hotel business, and his earnest desire 
to please his patrons has secured him a continuance of a liberal patronage. 

On the 2d of September, i860, Mr. Gibson was united in marriage to 
Miss Henrietta Combs, a native of Canada, who was born in Hamilton on 
the i8th of September, 1844. She is a daughter of David and Eliza (Wood- 
ruff) Combs. ]\Irs. Gibson was reared in Chicago, to which city she was 
taken by her parents in her early girlhood days. By her marriage she has 
become the mother of three children, two sons and a daughter : Walter, who 
follows farming in Lake county, Indiana ; Florence, who is the wife of Harry 
Miles, of Michigan City, Indiana ; and George, a blacksmith liy trade, who 
is now engaged in business along that line in California. 

Mr. Gibson has spent the greater part of his life in this county and is 
the oldest living resident of his portion of the county, his connection there- 
with covering sixty-seven years. He is therefore well known, and the circle 
of his friendship has broadened as the circle of his accjuaintance has been 
extended. He is a man of many strong characteristics, and his good qualities 
have won for him the regard of his fellow men. His political allegiance is 
given to the Democracy, but he has never bad time nor inclination to seek 

public office. 

STEPHEN MEYERS. 

A native of Germany, 'Sir. Meyers was born in Prussia, on the 22d of 
June, 1842, a son of Mathias and Elizabeth INIeyers, both of whom were 
natives of Germany, where tliey resided until 1858, when they crossed the 
Atlantic and established their home upon a farm in Hanover township, Lake 
county, Indiana, the father there carrying on agricultural pursuits for a 
number of years. 

In the public schools of Germany Stephen IMeyers acquired his educa- 
tion and when sixteen years of age he accompanied his parents to the new 
world. The remainder of his minority was spent on the old homestead farm 




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HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 433 

in Hanover township, and practical business methods became famihar to him 
through the assistance which he rendered his father in the cultivation of the 
fields and the sale of the crops. In 1886 he engaged in the saloon business 
at Hanover Center, and for thirty-two years he actively cnntinuecl that busi- 
ness in Hanover townshi]). He also became the owner of a farm. .\s the 
years passed he added to In's financial resources and he is now loaning money 
and buying commercial paper. 

On the 28th of August, 1866, Air. Meyers was united in marriage to 
Miss Catherine BechtlofT, a native of Germany, who came to America in 
April, 1866. They hare four living children : Mathias. Stephen, Katie 
and Frank. 

Mr. Meyers has been somewhat prominent in community ai¥airs. He 
was elected assessor of Hanover township and filled the position for five 
years. He was also chosen by popular sufifrage to the office of trustee and 
served for six years. He has been a resident of Lake county for forty-six 
years, his family locating here in pioneer times. He and his family are 
members of the Catholic church and are well known in the county. Leav- 
ing Hanover Center, Mr. Meyers established his home in Crown Point, and 
is well known in the city and throughout this portion of the state where he 

has so long resided. 

ALBERT J. SWANSON. 

Albert J. Swanson. who is filling the office of township trustee and is 
engaged in the hardware business at Hobart, Indiana, is a worthy citizen 
that Sweden has furnished to Lake county and in his Inisiness career and 
private life he displays many of the strong and commendable qualities of the 
Swedish race. He was born April 6, 1868, a son of John and Beatrice Swan- 
son. He was only two years old when his parents crossed the Atlantic to 
America, establishing their home in Moline, Illinois, whence they came to 
Lake county, Indiana, in October, 1871. Air. Swanson was then only three 
vears of age. He pursued his education in the puldic schools of Hobart and 
in a Swedish school at that place, and when fifteen years of age he started out 
to earn his own li\ing. working" for George Stoker in a general store in 
Hobart. There he remained for two years, and at the end of that time ac- 
cepted a clerkship in the store of J. E. Mander, with whom he continued for 
three months. His ne.xt employer was J. J. Wood, a general merchant of 

28 



434 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Hobart. with whom he continued lor two years, and later he was a salesman 
in the genera! store of B. W. Stratton. In 1891 he embarked in merchandis- 
ing on his own account in partnership with his brother. F. P. Swanson. They 
purchased the grocery department in the store of B. \\'. Stratton, and after a 
partnership of three years Albert J. Swanson bought his brother's interest 
and continued in the grocery trade until 1900. He then sold out and pur- 
chased the hardware store of A. Mealin. He has since added to- his stock 
• and is now conducting a well equipped hardware, tin shop, and plumbing 
establishment. He has secured a good patronage, and his constantly grow- 
ing trade is now bringing to him a very desirable financial return. He is 
also engaged in dealing in coal in jiartnership with William Jahnke, their 
yards being situated along the line of the Nickle Plate Railroad track. 

In 1891 was celebrated the marriage of Mr. Swanson and Miss Mar- 
garet Cooke, a daughter of M. J. and Elizabeth Cooke. They have four 
children : Beth, Margaret, Geraldine and Pliny. Beth is in the seventh grade, 
Margaret in the si.xth. Geraldine in the third, and Pliny in the second. 
Both of the two elder children have taken music. 

Mr. Swanson is a public-spirited citizen who has manifested an active 
interest in many measures pertaining to general progress. In politics he is 
a Republican, and in Noveml)er, 1900, was elected town.ship trustee, which 
position he is now filling. He is the youngest trustee that has ever served in 
Lake county, and lie was chosen to the office by one of the largest majorities 
ever given a candidate for the position. Mr. Swanson is the only 
trustee in the county of Lake who lias introduced a special teacher of music 
for the schools of the to\\nshii), which is Ifighly commendable, as an educa- 
tive element. The teacher in charge. Miss CleO' Z. Barnes, visits each school 
each week. Mr. Swanson has also introduced typewiiting in the public 
schools of Hobart, and it proves a successful venture. 

Fraternally he is connected with the Masonic lodge, the Independent 
Order of Odd Fellows, No. 333, the Knights of Pythias, No. 458, and the 
Knights of the Maccabees, Tent No. 65, and he iias filled all the offices in 
these various lodges with the exception of the Masonic. He is well known in 
the countv for his business ability and political activity, and he has made for 
himself a most creditable record. He started out in life empty-handed, and 
all that he possesses has been accumulated through his own nersistent pur- 
pose, capable management and progressive business methods. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 135 

GEORGE L. CASTLE. 

George L. Castle, now deceased, wlio was well known in Lake county, 
was born in Florence. Hiumii county, Oliio. Feliruary i8, iSy). His father, 
Scjuire Castle, was a nati\e of Vermont, whence he removed to Berrien 
county, Michigan, from Ohio, in 1850. Two years later he came to West 
Creek township. Lake county, Indiana, arriving here in 185J. George L. 
Castle was then Init thirteen years of age, and he continued his education in 
the district schools of West Creek township, while with farm work he be- 
came very familiar, gaining a broad practical experience as he assisted in 
the labors ot iield and meadow and in all departments of farm work. When 
the country became involved in Ci\il war, 4iowever. he put aside all busi- 
ness and personal considerations, for his patriotic spirit was aroused and he 
determined to aid his country in the preservation of the Union. Accordingly 
he enlisted in 1861, becoming a member of Company B, Twentieth Intliana 
^'olunteer Infantry, with which he served until 1864. He was orderly 
sergeant and took part in many hotly contested battles, displaying marked 
valor and loyalty upon the field. After being honorably discharged he re- 
turned to Lowell and took up the work of contracting, which he followed 
continuously in this county until June, 1882, when he removed to Chicago. 
There he engaged in dealmg in sand, graxel. brick and hnnlicr. and for 
twenty years was an active and enterprising business man of that cit\'. his 
death occurring on the 12th of October, 1902. in Lowell, Indiana. In his 
political views he was a Democrat, but the honors and enmluments of office 
had little attraction for him. 

On the 18th of December, 1866, Mr. Castle was united m marriage to 
Miss Laura P. Hull, who was born in Franklin county, Vermont, rjn the 
nth of February, 1847. Her father. Samuel P. Hull, was also a native of 
Franklin county and on eiuigrating westward estaljlished his home in Illinois, 
\\here he remained for two years. In 1867 he came to Lake count v, In- 
diana, locating at Lowell, where h.e followed the occupation of farming. His 
death occurred February 3, 1898. Mrs. Castle's mother, Emeline Castle, 
was likewise a native of Franklin county, Vermont, and it was in the Green 
Mountain state that she was married. Mr. Hull was at one time the owner 
of the land on which occurred the birth of the late President Arthur. To 



43fi HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. and Airs. Hull were born seven children, two sons and five daughters, 
namely: Jasper, Airs. Alary Edmonds, Mrs. Joseph A. Clark, Mrs. Laura 
Castle, Albert, Airs. William Sigler, and Airs. Stanley Babcock. who is now^ 
deceased. 

Mrs. Castle is the fourth child in tlie family, and was the mother of one 
daughter. Airs. Jessie B. C. Riggs, who died February 13, 1893, leaving 
a daughter, Laura AI. Riggs, whose birth occurred August 2S>, 1889. (See 
obituary.) Airs. Castle still carries on the business at Chicago which was 
established by her husband, and in this enterprise has the assistance of the 
secretary of the firm. She also owns a farm in West Creek township. Lake 
county, to which she gives her personal supervision. She is a woman of 
luisiness ability, keen foresight and marked enterprise and is capably con- 
ducting her \aried business interests. 

The following obituaries, while covering the main points sketched above, 
also further indicate the character and life of Air. Castle and his only daugh- 
ter and child : 

George L. Castle was born in tlie town of Florence. Huron county, 
Ohio, February 18, 1839, and died at his home in Lowell, Indiana, October 
12, 1902, at the age of 63 years, 7 months and 24 days. His sickness dates 
back nearly two years, in which time he has been attended by the best medi- 
cal skill, but all to no purpose. In hopes of regaining his health he went 
to Florida last winter, but was forced to return without obtaining the de- 
sired benefit. Since his return from the south his disease has been of a 
dropsical nature and that was probably the immediate cause of his death. 

\\'hen a lad of ten or twehe he moved with his parents to Alichigan., 
remaining there about two years, when they again moved, coming to Lake 
county, Indiana, arriving here February 18, 1852. since A\hich time Air. 
Castle has resided in or near Lowell, with the exception of a few years in 
Chicago. He was among our best citizens ; a man possessed of many noble 
traits of character, chief among which \\as his open-heartedness ; no one 
ever applying to him for assistance was turned away empty handed, if within 
his power to prevent. He was a man ver_\- highly respected by all who knew 
him for his honorable, upright ways. \Mien his country was in distress and 
needed his services he offered himself as a soldier, enlisting in Company B, 
20th I. V. V. I., lulv 22, 1861, and from which he was discharged as cor- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 437 

poral, July 29, 1864, after a faithful service of a little over three years. 

December 18, 1866. he was united in marriage with Miss Laura P. Hull. 
To this union was bom one daughter. Jessie, who liecame the wife of 
Howard E. Riggs. She died February 13, 1893. leaving a little daughter, 
Laura J\I. 

The funeral, which was largely attended, occur'red from his late home 
at 2 p. m., October 15. Ekler John Bruce assisted by Rev. D. D. Hoagland; 
pastor of the Methodist Episcopal church, officiated. Funeral Director Clif- 
ford Stowell had charge of the burial service. Literment was made in the 
Lowell cemetery. 

He leaves his wife, three brothers: John M. and Mortimer, of Lowell, 
and Charles E. of DeBorgia. Montana, one grand-daughter, Laura M. Riggs, 
together with a large number of relatives to mourn his death, to whom the 
Tribune extends sincere sympathy in their darkest hour of sorrow. 

Died, at her home in Englewood, February 13, 1893, Jessie Bell (Castle) 
Riggs, aged 24 years, 4 months and 24 days, Jessie Bell was born in Kan- 
sas City, Missouri, September 20, 1868. She was the only child of Mr. and 
Mrs. George L. Castle, of South Chicago, and wife of Howard Riggs. She 
came with her parents to Lowell, Indiana, when about three months old, 
where she resided till she was fourteen years of age. from whence she moved 
with her parents to South Chicago, Illinois. She was married to Howard 
Riggs, of Cambridge, Ohio, September 20. 1888. To this union two children 
were born, a daughter and a son. The son preceded its mother to the Spirit 
Land about two years ago. Her funeral took place from the Methodist 
Episcopal church, Thursday, Rev, Bird, of South Chicago, officiating, as- 
sisted by Rev, Bruce, of Lowell, where a large concourse of relatives and 
friends gathered to pay the last sad tribute of respect to one v.-ho was loved 
and held in high esteem by all who knew her. Her remains were laid in the 
Lowell cemetery, there to rest until the morn of resurrection, from whence 
she will come forth and her garments shall be white. She leaves a husband 
and daughter, and father and mother, and other relati\'es a.nd friends to 

moiu^n her loss. 

JOHN DWYER. 

John Dwyer, whose intense and well directed activity in business af- 
fairs has won him success, is now living a retired life in Lowell and enjoys 



438 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

in high measure tlie respect and esteem of tlie community. He is an honored 
veteran of the Ci\il war, has served as auditor of Lake county and in all 
relations of life has been found trustworthy and loyal. .\ native of Knox 
county, Ohio, his birth occurred on the 26th of June. 1834. His grand- 
father, James Dwyer, was born in the north of Ireland, and on coming to 
America settled in ^Maryland. His father, John Dwyer, was a native of 
Marvland and settled in Knox county, Ohio, in 180S, becoming one of the 
pioneer residents of that portion of the state. He was a carpenter and joiner 
and also a cabinet-maker, and he carried on business at ]Mount Vernon, Ohio, 
along those lines. His remaining days were spent in the Buckeye state, 
where he died at the age of seventy-eight years. His political allegiance was 
given to the Democracy in early manhood, liut in 1856 he joined the ranks of 
the new Republican party and voted for John C. Fremont. His religious 
faith was indicated by his memliership in the Baptist churcli. His wife 
bore the maiden name of Sarah Martin and was a native of Huntingdon 
county, Pennsylvania, where she was reared. She, too, spent her last days 
at Mount Vernon, Ohio, and passed away at the very advanced age of sev- 
enty-seven years, there being only a week's difference in the date of hers 
and her husband's death. This worthy couple were the parents of three sons 
and eight daughters, all of whom reached years of maturity. 

John Dwyer, the ninth child and second son of the family, was reared 
in Knox county, Ohio, and pursued his education in Frederickton Academy 
and in Oberlin College. He learned the trade of a millwright m the county 
of his nativity, serving a full term of apprenticeship, but siion afterward 
gave up the liusiness. He followed that pursuit for nine months in Iowa. 
In 1854 he removed to Lake county, Indiana, settling at Crown 'Point, and 
engaged in farming one mile east of the city, carrying on that pursuit for 
about three years. 

In the meantime 'Slv. Dwyer was married on the 28th of December, 
1856, the lady of his choice being Aliss Cornelia A. Clark, a daughter of 
Tabez and ^Marrelle E. (Burrows) Clark, in whose family were seven chil- 
dren, two daughters and fi\-e sons. ]\Irs. Dwyer, the second in order of 
birth, was born m Tompkins county, Xew York, June 2y. 1837, and was 
but seven months old when she was brought to Lake county, Indiana, b}- her 
parents, who located at Lowell. The father was a farmer by occupation 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 439 

and, securing land from the government, at nnce liegan its cultix-atinn and 
development, transforming the wild tract into richly cultivated fields. He 
continued to carry en farming' up to the time of his death, which occurred 
in 1876, when he was sixty-eight years of age. His wife died in her eighty- 
eighth year. Mrs. Dwyer has one living brother. Perry D. Clark, of Lowell. 

In the year 1857 Air. and ]Mrs. Dwyer took up theii- abode upon a 
farm a half mile south of Lowell, and there he de\oted his energies to gen- 
eral agricultural pursuits for about a year and a half. At that time they 
removed to a farm two and a half miles northwest of Lowell, wdiere he was 
engaged in agricultural pursuits until 1861. Feeling then that his first duty 
was to his country he joined the bo}s in blue, enlisting as a member of Com- 
pany B, Twentieth Illinois Volunteer Infantry. He joined the armv as a 
private, but was soon afterward made corporal, and he ser\ed from June, 
1861, until ]May 5, 1864. He took part in a number of the leading battles 
of the Army of the Potomac and was wounded in the shoulder at the battle 
of Gettysburg by a minie ball. He was again wounded at the battle of the 
Wilderness on the 5th of ]\Iay, 1864, being struck in the knee by a minie 
ball. This necessitated the amputation of the left leg above the knee, and 
on account of bis severe injuries he was honorably discharged September 
25, 1864. 

Mr. Dwyer then returned to Lowell. He certainly made great sacri- 
fices for his country and yet he lias never regretted the part which he per- 
formed in the preservation of the Union. On again reaching Lake county 
he took up the work of school teaching, but after he had spent a month in 
that way he was appointed by Schuyler Colfax to a clerical position in the 
war department of Washington. Removing to that city he remained for 
seven \'ears in that department, on the expiration of which perio<I he resigned 
and returned to his old home in Lake county in 187 1. In the same vear he 
was made a candidate for the position of county recorder and was elected 
the following fall for a term of four years. During that period he made his 
home in Crown Point, and in the discharge of the duties of the office he was 
found most capable, efficient, prompt and faithful. On his retirement from 
official service he returned to Lowell and located on a farm a half mile south- 
west of the town, there remaining until 1882, when he sold his farm property 
an<l remo\'ed to Greencastle, Indiana, in order to educate his familv. Not 



440 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

long after his removal to that place he was re-appointed to a position in the 
war department at Washington and remained as a clerk there until 1890, when 
he again resigned and returned to Lowell, where his family had previously 
located. He has since lived retired in the enjoyment of a rest which he has 
truly earned. 

Mr. and Mrs. Dwyer are the parents of seven children, but John Byron 
died at the age of three years and twins died in infanc}'. while Bessie Eliza 
died at the age of seventeen months. The others are Cassius C. Schuyler 
C, who is an attorney at Lowell ; and Sylvia May. the wife of Roy I\I. 
Abrams, of Indianapolis, Indiana. 

Mr. Dwyer has been a life-long Republican, nex'er faltering in his al- 
legiance to the party, which stood as the defender of the L'nion in the dark 
days of the Civil v.-ar and which has ever been the champion of progress, 
reform and improvement. He is a member of the Grand Army post at 
Lowell, and thus maintains pleasant relations with his old army comrades. 
He has a wide and favorable acquaintance in Lake county, and during his 
residence elsewhere he has felt the keenest interest in the development of 
this portion of the state. In all life's relations he has been true to duty and 
in matters of citizenship is as loyal to-day as when he followed the old 
flag upon battlefields of the south. 

iMAHLON HATHAWAY. 

Mahlon Hathaway is one of the representative agriculturists and stock- 
raisers of ^\'est Creek township, and is a man whose success in life and 
prominence as a citizen well deserve mention in such a historical record as 
this present \olume. He is a native of Kankakee county, Illinois, where he 
v.'as born November 17, 1856. He is the eldest of the three children, two 
sons and one daughter, born to Bethuel and Lucinda (Hayden) Hathaway. 
His brother Henry, next to him in age. is an agriculturist of \\'est Creek 
to\\'nship, a successful man. and is married and has a family. Janie, the sis- 
ter, is the wife of Charles Belshaw. a farmer at Lowell. The father of this 
family was born in New York state about 1818. and died in Lake county, 
Indiana, when about seventy years old. He was reared to manhood in his 
native state, and received his public school education there. He ^^■as a pioneer 
of Lake county, being among those who came in 1843, '^"d he purchased a 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. HI 

hundred and sixty acres of land in West Creek tuwnsliip and was a suc- 
cessful farmer during the remainder of his active career. He acquired an 
estate of two hundred and seventy-five acres, all situated in West Creek town- 
ship. He was an energetic personality, and in business affairs was aggres- 
siA-e and prosperous. He was an out and out Republican in politics, and he 
and his wife were memliers of the Methodist church. 

Mr. Hathaway was reared to the age of ten years in Kankakee county, 
and since then has been a resident of Lake county. He was educated in 
the common schools, and gained much of life's training by personal appli- 
cation. He had only a small capital when he arrived at majority, and his 
subsequent success has been almost entirely by his own efforts. He mar- 
ried Miss Julia Smith, by whom he had three children, two living: Blanche 
completed the eighth grade of school, and Carrie is at home and in the ninth 
grade of the Lowell high school. The mother of these children died in 1886, 
and f(.)r his second wife ^Nlr. Hathaway married Miss Barbara Grimes, who 
is the mother of four children, as follows : Leslie, who is in the eighth 
grade in school, and a bright lad in his studies ; Gladys, in the fifth grade ; 
Lucille ; and Archie, the youngest. 

Mrs. Hathaway was born in Kankakee county, Illinois, in 1866, and 
was reared and educated in her native county. She was a rtudent of the 
Valparaiso College, and was also engaged in teaching for several years. 
Mr. Hathaway is a stanch Republican, and cast his first vote for the lamented 
Garfield. He has been chosen as a delegate to the county conventions, and 
has in various ways been active in practical politics in this county. Mr. 
and Mrs. Hathaway are members of the Methodist Episcopal church in 
A\'est Creek township. Their homestead is in this same township, where 
they possess one hundred and forty acres of good land. The buildings about 
this farm are first class, and in 1898 he erected a modern residence and one 
t.f the most charming homes in the neighborhood. He was fonnerly engaged 
in the milk business, shipping all his product, but he has of late years bought 
a De La\-al separator and begun the making of butter at home, which he 
finds a more satisfactorj- enterprise. Mr. Hathaway is one of the success- 
ful men of the county, and has won a large degree of material prosperity and 
attained the recognition and esteem of his fellow citizens through his well 
directed eft'orts and honest endeavor. 



442 !;:STORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

A.MOS BRAXNON. 

Amos Erannon, a retired iarmer of Lowell, who was dependent upon 
his own resources for a li\ing from an early age. is a self-made man. whose 
record is creditable and well worthy of emulation. He started out in life 
empty-handed, and, realizing that labor is the basis of all success, he worked 
diligently and persistently for many years and is now the possessor of a 
very comfortable competence. Moreover, he has advanced far on life's 
journey, reaching a stage in which nature seems to have intcided that man 
should put aside active business cares and spend the evening of life in quiet. 

]\Ir. Brannon was born in Summit county. Ohjo, on the 4th of Septem- 
ber, 1821. His father was William Brannon, whose parents were natives 
of Ireland. The mother bore the maiden name of Lucina Loveland. and was 
born in Vermont. William Brannon died in Ohio in 1828 when his son 
Amos was but seven years of age. but the mother lived to be more than 
eighty years of age. In their family were eight children, seven of whom 
reached mature years. Of this number Amos Brannon was tiie third child 
and second son. After his father's death he remained with his mother, but 
worked out for a living until twenty-two years of age. He then came to 
Indiana, locating in Porter county in the spring of 1843, ^'""^^ '" the fall of 
the same year he came to Lake county. Here he engaged in farming, pur- 
chasing a small tract of land in ^^'est Creek township. This was wild and 
unimproved and covered eighty acres. \\'ith characteristic energy he began 
its development and continued the work of improvement until he sold the 
property and purchased an adjoining farm of two hundred and forty acres. 
This he also improved, breaking the prairie and transforming wild land 
into rich and productive fields. He continued agricultural imrsuits there 
until 1885. when he retired and removed to Lowell. He has since built a 
good residence in the town and is now comfortably situated in life. During 
the early years of his residence in Indiana he bravely faced all the hard- 
ships and dangers of frontier life and performed the arduous task of de- 
veloping two new farms, but as the years passed by excellent results at- 
tended his efforts, making him one of the substantial farmers of the com- 
munity. 

On the 18th of September, 1844, Mr. Brannon was united in marriage 
to Miss Sallie Taylor, who was born in Erie county, Pennsyh-ania, April 6, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 443 

iSj", and is a daughter of CaUin and Mary Ann ( Xugant ) Taylor. They 
came to LaPorte C(iunt\-, Imhana, in 1S34. casting in their lot ^xith the early 
pioneer settlers. Subsequently they removed to Porter county. Indiana, 
where the mother died, while the father's death occurred in Lockport. Illi- 
nois. In their family were five children, of whom ^Irs. Brannon is the 
eldest. She came to Lake county when but fourteen )'ears of age, and has 
lived here continuously since. The home of Air. and Mrs. Brannon has 
been blessed with ele\en children, seven of whom }'et siu'\i\e, while four 
have passed away, namely: W'illia, Ahkis. Cal\-in and James M. Those 
still li\'ing are Mary Ann. Amelia. Ida, Milo, William J. and Lucian and 
Lucina. twins. All were born in West Creek township. Lake cijunty. and the 
living children are married and ha\-e established comfortable homes of their 
own. Both Mr. and Airs. Brannon hold membership in the Methodist Epis- 
copal church, and take zealous and acti\'e interest in its wcrk. He has 
long been a Republican, voting for Fremont on the organization of the 
party, and twice supporting Aljraham Lincoln for the presidency. Mr. Bran- 
non has tra\-eled far on life's journe}' and can look back over the past 
without regret and forward to the future without fear, for his has been an 
honorable, active antl useful career. He has never lieen known to take 
ad\-antage of the necessities of his fellow men in any trade transactions, 
but has beeii just and considerate of others, and in his business life as 
well as in social circles has gained warm personal regard and respect. 

HENRY SUPRISE. 

From an early period in the de\-elopment of Lake county Henry Suprise 
has been numbered among its residents, and is now a prominent old set- 
tler well deser\"ing of mention in this volume. He lives on section 18, 
Cedar Creek township. A native of New York, he was born on the ist of 
December, 1830, and is of French lineage. His father, Peter Suprise, was 
born in France and came to America when about thirty-fi\-e years old. He 
located in Lake county among its pioneer residents, being one of the first 
settlers of Cedar Creek township, and there he li\'ed to the very ad\-anced 
age of about one hundred and nine years. In early manhood he married 
Rosina Taylor, who was born in Canada and was reared and married there. 
Thev removed to New York, wh.ere thev remained one vear, and then came 



444 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

to Lake county, Indiana, where Mrs. Suprise died when about eighty-three 
years of age. They were the parents of four sons and three daughters, who 
are now hving. 

Henry Suprise. the third child of the family, was only six months old 
when brought to Lake county. Indiana. His educational privileges were 
extremely meager, for he began to work as soon as old enough and as- 
sisted his father in the arduous task of developing a new farm and continu- 
ing its cultivation. He became familiar with every department of farm 
labor and continued to aid his father on the old homestead vmtil he had 
attained his majority and afterward cared for his father until the latter's 
death. 

In 1833 occurred the marriage of Heniw Suprise and ^liss Elizabeth 
Hill, a daughter of James and ]NTary ( Skinner) Hill. She was born in 
Decatur county, Indiana, near Greensburg, July 12. 1841. The young couple 
began their domestic life in Cedar Creek township, where Air. Suprise en- 
gaged in general farming, and he has since followed that pursuit. In the 
winter he buvs and sells cattle, and he is widely recognized as one of the 
most successful farmers in the county and one of the most extensive land- 
owners, his realty possessions now aggregating about one thousand acres. 
He worked hard and persistently in the early years of his married life, and 
as liis financial resources increased he made judicious investment in property 
until to-day he is one of the leading land-holders of this portion of the 
state. He also owns stock in the Lowell National Bank at Lowell, and is 
one of its directors, and to a greater or less extent he has engaged in loan- 
ing money in Lake county. 

To Mr. and Mrs. Suprise have been born three children who are yet 
living: Jasper, Albert and William, all residents of Lake county. They 
also lost one child. Since the organization of the Republican party Mr. 
Suprise has given to it a stalwart and unfaltering support, where matters of 
state and national interest are involved, but at local elections he votes in- 
dependently, giving his ballot for men and measures rather than for party. 
In matters of citizenship he is public-spirited and progressive, and his pa- 
triotism stands as an unquestioned fact in his career. He has, therefore, 
co-operated in many movements for the general good and has been particu- 
larly active in the agricultural development and progress of northwestern 
Indiana. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 445 

AIRS. SARAH E. NICHOLS. 

The ladies of our state and nation play a most conspicuous part in the 
affairs of home and community, although "the liappiest women, like the 
happiest nations, have no history," their li\-es and influence being among 
the "silent forces" which effect great works without display or heralding 
abroad. .Among the worthy, noble and esteemed wnmen of Lowell is to be 
numbered Airs. Sarah E. Xichols, who has lived in this county a number of 
years and has made her influence felt through her family and in whatever 
relation she has touched the society about her. 

Mrs. Nichols was born in Barnston Corner, Lower Canada, February 
24, 1845, being the third of four children, one son and three daughters, 
born to Hiram and Elvira (Sprague) Wheeler. Her two sisters are still 
living, Matilda, a widow, being a resident of Arkansas City, Kansas, and 
Laura the wife of Alexander McNay, of Lowell, Indiana. Her father was 
born in Canada about 1818, and followed the occupation of farming. Mrs. 
Nichols' mother was also a native of Canada, and her death occurred when 
the former was about seven years old. 

Mrs. Nichols being left an orphan was reared by her grandmother until 
she was fourteen years old, and her education was received in the common 
schools. Alarch 29, 1862, she married Horatio J. Nichols, in this county. 
They became the parents of ten children, four sons and six daughters, and 
six of them are still living : Laura was educated in the Lowell schools and 
still resides in this town: she wedded Sigel Hayden, and has two children: 
Harry S., in the second year of high school, and Harold J., in the sixth 
year of Lowell schools. Wheeler J., a stock buyer and farmer at Lowell, 
married Miss Cora Davis and has three children, Dilwyn and Ruth and Ruby, 
twins; his wife was educated in the Crown Point high school and was a 
successful Lake county teacher : he is the owner of a nice farm in this county 
and also of real estate in Lowell, and in politics is a Republican. Sadie 
Nichols is a successful teacher, and has studied music. Pearl, who graduated 
from the Lowell high school in. 1896 and has shown considerable abilitv as 
an artist in crayons, is now the wife of Emil Ruge, who was engaged in the 
mercantile business at Lowell. Calhoun, one of the popular young Repub- 
♦ licans of Lowell, married Miss Lona Flynn, who is a daughter of an ex- 



•i46 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

soldier of the Civil war and who spent three years in the high school at 
Rensselaer, Indiana; they have two children, Halhert and Vilmer. Huron, 
the youngest, is a brigh.t pupil in the eighth grade of the Lowell schools. 
JMrs. Nichols" deceased children ha\e the following record : Edna, who 
died in 1S94, was the wife of William Bruce and had two children, Carrie 
and Bertie. Albert, who was killed by lightning in June, 1896, had by his 
wife, Amma Pinkerton, now a resident of Lowell, four children. Fern, Guy, 
Beulah and Bertie. Jessie, deceased wife of Bert Holshaw, passed away 
February i, 1897, she being a well educated and most lovable young woman. 
The boy Fay is in the third grade. 

Horatio J. Nichols was a nati\e of Lake county, born January 4, 1841. 
and his death occurred September 12. 1898. He was reared and educated in 
this county, and being trained on his father's farm he early took to farm- 
ing pursuits, and be followed that occupation and dealing in stock f<ir his 
career. He lost his father when he was young, and he remamed with his 
mother and was her mainstay and ])rincipal support for many years. He 
was a student in a log-caliin school, and his early life in Lake county was 
spent among pioneer conditions. He and his wife began their married life 
without nnich cajiital. and their success was due to their happy combination 
of energy and good management. The first land he bought was forty acres 
in Cedar Creek township, and he went in debt for part of it, but their dili- 
gence soon paid off all the incumbrance, and after selling it they bought land 
in Cedar Creek and West Creek townships, and at his deatii he was the 
possessor of o\'er four lumdred acres of land, an estate which is still held 
hv the family entire. It was in 1887 that thev erected their pretty residence 
in the western part of Lowell, on Cummercial avenue, and it still retains its 
reputation as a home of genuine hospitality and good cheer. 

Mr. Nichols was an ardent supporter of the Republican jiartx'. and his 
first presidential \'ote was cast for .\be Lincoln, and he continued to up- 
hold the party doctrines and candidates from that time till his death. He 
was a man of generous nature, offering his philanthropy to those in need; 
and being a man of the strictest honor and integrity, his word was always 
considered as good as his bond. In his death the community lost a most 
worthy citizen, and his family lost their best friend, for he was a lover 
of home and fireside and found his chief delight when among his family. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 447 

In 1895 he and his wife made an extended trip to the east, to Boston, and on 
the return visiting Mrs. Nichols" old home in Canada. His remains rest 
in the Lowell cemetery, and a lieautiful monument stands sacred to his 
memory. 'Mrs. Nichols resides in her pleasant Lowell home, surrounded 
by children and friends, and her famil}" record forms a most important addi- 
tion to this history and genealogy of Lake county. 

JOHN G. ROBINSON. 

The Sage of Concord. Emerson, has said "there is no liistory : onlv 
biography."' and in the detailed life sketches that apfiear in this work will 
be f(_Huid the most authentic facts concerning the life and growth of Lake 
county as a social, industrial and political organization of the state of In- 
diana. The life of Mr. Robinson, of West Creek township, for long one of 
the foremost citizens and representative men, adds additional facts to the 
completeness of this work, for most of his active career has been passed in 
this county. 

He was born in the old Bay state of Massachusetts, Aprii 12, 1846, a 
son of John G. and .Vdeline (Thayer) Robinson. There were six children, 
four sons and two daughters, in the family, and he is the second oldest of 
the five now living, the others being as follows: Sumner T., now residing 
in Sac City. Iowa, was formerly a farmer and later a minister of the Metho- 
dist Episcopal church, and during the Ci\i] war was a member of the Seventh 
Indiana Cavalry, as part of the Army of the Potomac, and during a skirmish 
was shot through the shoulder. Ellen, who was a successful teacher in 
Porter county for a number of years, is now the widow of Anthnnv Smith 
and resides in Valparaiso. Emily, who also taught for some years, is the 
wife of Lemmon Cain, a farmer of Porter county. William is an agri- 
culturist of St. Joseph county, Indiana. 

Mr. Robinson's father was also a native of Massachusetts, had a com- 
mon school education, and followed the vocations of shoemaking and farm- 
ing. For three years he followed the L'nion flag as a member of Com- 
pany H, Twentieth Indiana Infantry, and at the terrible battle of the Wilder- 
ness, on May 12, 1864, gave up his life for his countiy. Of the one hun- 
dred and one men of his company who went into that memorable engage- 
ment, only four came out unscathed, the dead and wounded being piled up 



448 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Aac tiers deep. He had been an ardent Republican and an admirer of Lin- 
coln. He had come to Porter county. Indiana, in 1854. and purchased land 
on which he made his home until going to the war. His wife was also born 
in Massachusetts, and the Robinsons and Thayers were both of English 
origin. 

I\Ir. Roliinson was eighteen years old when his father died, and he lost 
his mother also when he was a boy. Even while his father was away in 
defense of the flag the care and responsibility of the home devolved in great 
measure upon him, so that he has been serious-minded and practical from 
an early age. He has made farming his life vocation, and his early educa- 
tion was obtained in the common schools. He is of the constantly decreasing 
number who can look back to a log-cabin school as the scene of schoolboy- 
days. Over in Porter county he daily for several months in the year 
attended a school held in a sixteen by sixteen foot, round-log building, with 
roof of shakes, and furnished inside and out in the most primitive pioneer 
plainness. Ray's arithmetic and the elementary spelling Ixjok formed his 
intellectual pabulum, and from these facts it may be understood how far 
education has ad\-anced since the youth of Mr. Robinson. 

On Christmas day of the year 1869 Mr. Robinson married Miss Sarah 
J. Evans, who became the mother of seven children, four sons and three 
daughters, five of whom are living: James W'.. a farmer residing east of 
Crown Point in Center township, was educated in the common schools and 
by hip marriage to Miss Laura Kobelin had two children. John L. Hannon 
anfi Victor William. John Mehin. who was educated in the common 
schools and is a prosperous farmer in West Creek township, married Miss 
Ella Surprise. Kittie is the wife of ^^'i^iam Futhey, who is a practical 
farmer and also managed the construction of the water-works systems in 
\\'isconsin. Illinois and Indiana. Frank Evans, now of Lowell, was edu- 
cated in the common schools, a graduate of the township high school in the 
class of 1900. took the teacher's course at the \'alparaiso normal, and was 
a successful teacher in ^\'est Creek township for four years : he wedded 
Miss Ina Klein, daughter of John Klein. Louisa, the youngest of the fam- 
ilv, completed the eleventh grade in the high school, graduating from com- 
mon school in 1899, taught for two years, part of the time in Kankakee 
county, Illinois, took her second term in the Valparaiso normal, and is now 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 449 

teaching in her home district. The daughter Nellie died at two years of 
age, and Charhe died when one year old. 

Mrs. Robinson was born in Miami county, Ohio, December 29, 1848, 
being the fourth of seven chilth'en, two sons an<l five daughters, born to 
James and Mary (Wait) Evans. She has a brother and a sister still living; 
Robert Evans, who has been employed in the Chicago' city postofiice for the 
past eight years, and was a teacher in Lake county eight years, finished his 
education at Valparaiso, and is a married man; her sister Mary is the wife 
of Oscar Kitcheil, a mechanic residing in Englewood, Chicago, and she 
taught successfully in Porter and Lake counties. James Evans, her father, 
was a native of Ohio, of Welsh origin. He was a farmer, and about 1849 
settled in LaPorle county. He was a Democrat in politics, and he and his 
w-ife were members of the Baptist church. He died in West Creek town- 
ship of this county September 21, 1877, and his wife in Porter county August 
II, 1886. Mrs. Robinson's great-grandfather Wait was a hero in the Rev- 
olutionary war, and her grandmother's name was Goble. Mrs. Robinson has 
spent most of her life in Porter and Lake counties, and her education was 
received in the common schools. 

For the first five years of their wedded life Mr. and Mrs. Robinson 
resided in Porter county, and then came to Cedar Creek township, Lake 
county, which was their home for thirteen years, and in 1888 they took up 
their residence in \\'est Creek township. They have friends throughout the 
count}', and are universally esteemed for their worth and upright lives. Mr. 
Robinson is a Republican. ha\-ing cast bis first vote for General Grant. He 
and his good wife were formerly members of the Baptist church denomina- 
tion, Ijut now belong to the Christian church at Lowell, and contribute to all 
worthy benevolences according to their means. 

JOHN SPRY. 

John Spry, of West Creek township, is a progressive and prosperous 
farmer of this part of the county, and during the years of his residence has 
commended himself to his fellow citizens by his capable industry and integ- 
rity of character. .\s a tiller of the soil he is one of the solid and substantial 
units from which the strength of the nation is formed, and he is the more 

29 



450 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

highly esteemed as a citizen and a man because he has gained his own suc- 
cess in the world, being both a self-educated and a self-made man. 

Mr. Spry is a native of the old blue-grass state of Kentucky, and was 
born August 7, 1846, being the seventh in order of birth of the nine children, 
four sons and five daughters, born to John and Melvina (Kimbrell) Spr^-. 
He has two brothers living, Enoch, a farmer at Momence, Illinois, and 
Green, a farmer of old Kentucky, both these brothers being older than ]\Ir. 
John Spry. The father of the family was born in South Carolina in 1807 
and died about 1856, when John was ten years old. He was by occupation 
a farmer, and adhered to the Democratic party. His wife was born in Ken- 
tucky about 181 1, and died in 1865. Both were members of the Methodist 
church. 

Mr. John Spry was reared in his native state, and he is one of the men 
yet living who passed their school days in the now out-of-date log-cabin 
schoolhouse. The one he attended was about twenty by forty feet in size, 
was heated by a fireplace, and had one long window in the end. And the 
text-books were Webster's speller and McGuffey's well known readers, 
grammar and geography. He has also used the goosequill pen, and seen it 
fashioned out by the master's hand. \Mien he entered u])on his career of 
independent activity at the age of eighteen his material capital consisted of a 
liorse, a cow and one bed, but he had plenty of energy and determination, 
"which are, after all, the principal factors in acquiring success, as he has ex- 
perienced it. 

On October zy, 1864, he married ^Nliss Catharine White, and eight chil- 
dren were born of this union, seven of them now li\ing: Bessie is the wife 
of James Little, a prosperous Lake county farmer whose history appears 
elsewhere in this work; Sadie is the wife of Don Cadwell, a barber of Crown 
Point; Mollie is the wife of Emil Larrison, a farmer of W^est Creek town- 
ship; William C, a farmer of Cedar Creek township, is married and has 
two children; Solomon is a farmer of W'est Creek township and is married; 
Clarence, of W'est Creek township, is a farmer and married : Earnie is at 
home with his parents. Mrs. Spry was born in Clarke county, Kentucky, 
in 1847, and six of her children were born in that state. 

About the year 1879 Mr. Spry brought his family to Kankakee county, 
Illinois, and followed farming there as a renter for six years, after which 



15 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. iol 

lie located in \\'e?t Creek township, this county, and continued tenant farm- 
ing for some }-ears. He was prosperous and a good manager of his affairs, 
and in 1894 he purchased one hundred and forty-nine acres in West Creek 
township. At the present writing he lives on and farms his nice estate of 
eighty acres, and lie has surrounded Iiimsclf with many of tlie comforts of 
life, besides doing his full duty by his children and seeing them all well 
started in the world. He is a Republican and has supported the principles 
of his party since casting his first vote. He and his wife are members of 
the Christian church, and are generous of their means and efforts in ad- 
vancing any worthy cause. 

A. B. CHIPMAN. 

The enterprising agriculturist is the factor wlio plays the most con- 
spicuous part in the records of a state or nation, and really furnishes the 
groundwork upon which all other classes of citizens stand. West Creek 
township of Lake county has long been noted for the excellence of its soil 
and the worth of its farm lands when properly cultivated, and one might 
travel all through the township and not find a farmstead which he could more 
easily pronounce a model in all respects than that owned by Mr. A. B. Chip- 
man. He is not an old resident of Lake county, but makes up in enterprise 
and public-spirited interest in local aft'airs Vihat he lacks in length of citizen- 
ship, so that he and his worthy family hold high rank in the esteem of their 
friends and associates. 

I\Ir. Chipman was born in Kankakee county. Illinois. November 20, 
1867. being a son of Ansel B. and Laura (Sanger) Chipman, six of whose 
children are still living. His fatlier was a native of Canada and of English 
descent. He was born about 1820, and died when sixty-eight years old, 
having spent his active life in farming pursuits. He left Canada when a 
young man and came to the United States, where he was married. He 
owned a farm in Yellowliead township. Kankakee county, and he passed 
away in that township. In politics he was a stanch Republican. His wife 
was born in the state of Ohio, and is still living at the age of seventy-one 
years, bearing th.e weight of years with singular brightness. She makes her 
home with her cb.ildren, whose homes, are always open with filial love to 
receive her. 

Mr. A. B. Chij^man made the beginning of his acti\-e career with very 



452 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

little capital. He received a common school education, but is in the main a 
self-educated and self-trained man. From his own early experience it has 
become his ambition to give his own children as good an education as is 
possible. 

He made his home with his parents until he was twenty-one years old. 
and on December 29. 1888, he was married to Miss Laura E. Kelsey. Of 
this happy marriage there are three children, one son and two daughters : 
Mildred has received her diploma for completing the eighth grade of school 
and has taken instrumental music; Edith has also completed the eighth 
grade and has taken musical instruction ; and Albert, the son, has reached 
the fifth grade of school. The children are very bright in their studies, and 
their parents may be \-ery proud of their auspicious start in life. Mrs. Chip- 
man is a native of Kankakee county, Illinois, and was born October 27, 
1864. She was educated in the public schools and was a teacher in Illinois 
for one term. She also had an excellent training in music and taught that 
art for some time. 

Mr. and Mrs. Chipman began their married life as renters in Kankakee 
county, where they remained some four or five years. Mrs. Chipman had 
forty acres in her own right, and they afterward purchased eighty acres. 
They continued with increasing success in Kankakee county for four years. 
In 1900 they purchased the beautiful farm known as the A. Brannon estate, 
from William Brannon, located just two miles from the prosperous town 
of Lowell, and the farm is convenient to business, markets and the schools. 
The farm contains two hundred and forty acres of as fine land as there 
is in West Creek township. The cosy and comfortable residence and the 
convenient outbuildings are also among the best to be found in the town- 
ship. The land is fairly well tiled, and this work of improvement is still 
progressing, Mr. Chipman having placed about ten thousand tiles during 
1903 and 1904. Mr. Chipman is a stanch Republican, and cast his first vote 
for Benjamin Harrison. He has been selected as a delegate from his town- 
ship to represent his party. 



F. RICHARD SCHAAF, SR. 

nents of success in life are ir 
individual, or whether they are quickened by a process of circumstantial de- 



Whether the elements of success in life are innate attributes of the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. . 453 

velopment, it is impossible to clearly determine. Yet the study of a suc- 
cessful life is none the less profitable by reason of the existence of this un- 
certainty, and in the majority of cases it is found that exceptional ability, 
amounting to genius, perhaps, was the real secret of the pre-eminence which 
many envied. Thus it appears to the student of human nature who seeks 
to trace the history of the rise of F. Richard Schaaf, Sr., a typical German- 
American of the best class. 

Mr. Schaaf was born in Saxony, Germany, on the 26th of March, 1857. 
and is a son of Ferdinand and Catherine Schaaf, who were also natives of 
the same country. The son was reared in that land and pursued his educa- 
tion in the pulilic schools of Germany. He also attended college there and 
was educated for the army in order to enter military ser\'ice .'is a \'eterinar\- 
surgeon with the rank of lieutenant. He volunteered to enter the army and 
by reason of this he was honorably discharged after two years six months. 
It was his desire to come to America, and for that reason he secured his 
release from the army. 

]\Ir. Schaaf was but fourteen years of age when left an orphan by the 
death of his parents, and when about twenty years of age he was married 
in the fatherland. He came to America about 1880 and the same year 
located in Chicago, where he became an employe in the tool department of 
the Electric Construction Company. He was a representative of that house 
for five years, at the end of which time he rented the American House, 
which was located at the corner of Twenty-second street and Archer avenue. 
This he conducted until 1889, when he came to Whiting and built the Berry 
Lake hotel. He continued as its manager and proprietor until 1893, when 
he sold out and removed to Robertsdale, where he established a grocery 
store. Later he turned his attention to the insurance business, and he now 
represents the Queen of America, the Hamburg, Bremen, the Norwich Union, 
the Hanover and the Scottish Union & National insurance companies ; also 
is notary public. His policies represent a large amount of msurance each 
year, and his business has grown to profitable proportions. Li his political 
allegiance Mr. Schaaf is a Democrat, and has been a member of the Ham- 
mond city council since 1894, covering a period of ten consecutive years. 
He has been verj- active as a representative of this body, has taken a deep 
interest in the city's welfare, has exercised his official prerogatives for the 



454 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

general progress and imjimvement and has done mucli in this way for the 
npbuilding of the city. He has been particularly active in locating school- 
houses, in opening and improving streets and he advocated the opening of 
W'oli river for harbor purposes ; and located Lake Front Park in Roberts- 
dale, Hammond. He is a strong believer in this harbor measure, and if it 
is carried into effect it will undoubtedly prove of great value in community 
interests. ]\Ir. Schaaf is also deputy assessor of North township. 

Jn 1877 occurred the marriage of F. Richard Schaaf and INIiss Catherine 
Schlueter, a native of Germany, and they have become the parents of seven 
children, namely : F. Richard, who is mentioned elsewhere in this volume, 
being well known in business circles in Whiting ; Clara ; George ; Elizabeth ; 
Catherine: Martha: and Edward. Socially Mr. Schaaf is connected with the 
Masonic fraternity, belonging to Waldeck Lodge No. 674, F. & A. M., of 
Chicago. He is likewise a member of Moltke Lodge, L O. O. F., of Ham- 
mond. A public-spirited citizen, his efforts in behalf of Lake county have 
been far-reaching and beneficial. He is one of the best known men of his 
locality, having resided here since the establishment of the towns of Whit- 
ing and Robertsdale. Recognizing the possibilities of these places he has 
contributed to general progress and improvement, and no man is more loyal 
to the best interests of this portion of the state. In his business career, too, 
he has made for himself an enviable name, and his life history shows what 
can be accomplished by determined effort and strong purpose. 

WILLIAM CHARLES BELMAN. 

William Charles Belman, cashier of the First National Bank of Ham- 
mond, is one of the leaders in business and financial affairs of this city. 
He is a self-made man, and has been dependent on his own exertions since 
he was fourteen years old. By hard labor and diligent application he be- 
came a successful teacher, and for many years was at the head of the Ham- 
mond public schools. From that profession he entered business, and for sev- 
eral years has taken an active part in the financial matters of Hammond. 

Mr. Belman was born in Detroit, Michigan, Alay i, 1S60, a son of 
William F. and Matilda H. (Sabine) Belman, the former a native of Penn- 
sylvania and the latter of Detroit. There was one other child of these par- 
ents, Lettie, wife of C. E. Cummins, of Putney, South Dakota. Mrs. Ma- 



lilSTORV OF LAKE COUNTY. 455 

tikla Belman died in Detroit in iS66. at the age of twenty-nine years. Slie 
was a member of tlie ^Methodist church. Her father was John Sabine, a 
son of Jolin and a nati\e of England. He came to America about 1827 
and settled in Detroit, where he followed his trade of harness-maker. He 
is still lix'ing at the age of eighty-eight years. By his wife. Maria Hagell, 
he had nine children. The father of William F. Belman. John Belman, was. 
also a native of England, whence he became an early settler of Pennsylvania 
and later of Detroit, where he spent the remainder of his life, dying at the 
age of seventy years. He was a shoemaker. His wife was Hannah Creigh- 
ton. and the_\- had nine children. William F. Belman learned the trade of 
harness-maker, and when a young man moved to Detroit, where he lived 
for many years and plied his craft. In 1869 he moved to Perry, Michigan, 
and bought a farm, on which he still resides. He married for his second 
wife Amanda Rowell, who died the following year. His present wife was 
Miss Elizabeth Gibbs. who is the mother of six children : Stella, wife of 
W. A. Tucker, of Des Aloines, Iowa; Vidi, of Perry, Michigan; Burchel, 
of Perry: Sarah, of Perry; Job, of Perry; and Bessie, of Perry. The par- 
ents of this famih' are both Methodists, and the father is a Republican. 

Mr. ^^"illiam C. Belman lived in Detroit until he was ten years old, 
receiving his first schooling there. At the age of fourteen he left his father's 
farm and came out to Indiana, where for several years he was engaged in 
hard manual labor on farms during most of each year, and at intervals attended 
the Valparaiso College. He became a successful teacher, anil for eighteen 
years previous to accepting the position of cashier of the First National 
Bank he was superintendent of the public schools of Hammond. He has 
held his present position for the past three years. He is also secretary- 
treasurer of the Lake County Savings and Trust Company and is president 
of the Hammond Building and Loan and Savings Association. 

yiv. Belman is a Republican in politics. He is a Master Mason of Gar- 
field Lodge. F. & A. M., and also afiihates with Hammond Lodge No. 210, 
Knights of Pythias, and with the National Union and Royal League so- 
cieties. He and his wife are members of the ^lethodist church, and he is a 
church trustee and steward and for a number of years served as superin- 
tendent of the Sunday school. He resides at 130 Ogden a\-enue, where 
he built his pleasant home in 1889. 



456 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

June 25, 1884, he married Miss Nettie Sinitli, a daughicr of Thomas 
W. and Sarah (McCabe) Smith. Mrs. Behnan was also a Methodist. She 
died in July. 1897, at the age of thirty-three, leaving two children, Charles 
and Edna. On August 10, 1899, Mr. Belman married Miss Emma Rork. 
a daughter of William Rork. They have a son. Creighton, and lost a daugh- 
ter in infancy. 

MRS. JOHANNA MEYER. 

Mrs. Johanna Meyer, of ^^'est Creek township, has, since the recent 
death of her husband, managed with fine executive ability the ai^airs of her 
fine homestead and farm, and has again illustrated woman's capacity for 
controlling the weightier matters of the world when such burden devolves 
upon her. The Meyer family belong to the thrifty and esteemed class of 
German-American citizens who have prospered so well in this country and at 
the same time have added so largely to its resources and high grade of citi- 
zenship. 

Mrs. Meyer was born in Westphalia, Germany, September 29. 1855, 
being the oldest in a family of six children, three sons and three daughters, 
born to Herman and Ann E. (Wilke) Krudup. Four of the children are 
still living, Mrs. Meyer being the oldest. Her brother, Herman C. is mar- 
ried and resides in Englewood, Chicago, where he is a salesman in a whole- 
sale grocery establishment: William F., married, is a harness-maker in Gibson 
Citv. Illinois : and John, who has a mercantile business in Brunswick, resides 
on the old homestead in Lake county, and is married. The two oldest of the 
children, both daughters, were born in Germany, while the others, four sons 
and one daughter, were born in tliis country. Their father was born, reared, 
and married in Germany, and was trained to the life and pursuits of farming. 
He brought his family to America about 1859, coming in a sailing vessel from 
Bremen, and it was nine weeks before they landed in New Orleans. Will 
county, Illinois, was their first destination, and from there they came to Lake 
countv, where the father purchased eighty acres of land which remained his 
home till his death, although he had increased his estate to one hundred and 
sixty acres. The farm was virgin soil when he first took hold of it, and all 
the improvements and sjstem of cultivation he brought about by his own 
efforts. He was a Republican, and the family religion was German Lutheran. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 457 

The mother was horn in the same part of Germany as lier husband, and she 
preceded him in death. 

Mrs. Meyer has spent ah hut the tirst four years of her hfe in Lake 
county, and she was educated in the common schools. October 26, 1871, she 
was united in marriage with John H. Meyer, and they had a happy union of 
nrany years, during whicli time seven children, tliree sons and four daughters, 
were born into their household, six of them being still living, as follows: 
Henry D., who was educated in the common schools, is a practical farmer 
and stockman and conducts the home farm, and is a Republican in political 
faith. Anna M., who was educated in the common schools and also in music, 
resides at home. Emma J\L. a graduate in 1903 and also trained in music, 
is at home, as is also the daughter Ida C, who graduated in 1904 and a 
student in Lowell High School. Herman C. is in the eighth grade of school, 
and Bertha, the youngest, is in the fifth grade. All the daughters have re- 
ceived musical instruction, and are bright and intelligent young ladies and 
are being well trained by their practical mother for the serious matters of the 
world. 

Mr. John H. Meyer, the father of happy memory, by whose death on 
April 16, 1900, the entire community as well as the family suffered a positive 
loss in character and worth of manhood, was born in Hanover, Germany, 
November 23, 1849. He was educated in the fatherland and was about 
twenty years old when he came to America with his father. In time he be- 
came recognized as one of the first-class farmers of West Creek township, 
although he began humbly and with little in the way of capital. He and his 
wife, after their marriage, made their beginning on one hundred and twenty 
acres of his father's estate, and by industry and frugality and good manage- 
ment between them they were enabled to build up a fine estate. They later pur- 
chased the tightv acres where the home residence is now located. This land 
had for some years previous been rented out, and was badly run down. He 
went to work fertilizing and increasing the productivity of the S(.)il and also 
improving the land Iiy buildings and the many facilities that marked the first- 
class agricultural property. The Meyer farm is now known as one of the 
model places of West Creek township, and one that any family might be 
proud to own. Since her husband's death Mrs. Meyer has for four years 
given her attention equally well to both household and outdoor duties of farm 



ioS HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

management, and with llie assistance ot her noble children has succeeded 
remarkably well in her enterprise. She is deserving of all credit for her 
capable direction of the farm as also for rearing such useful and worthy sons 
and daughters and providing well for their education and training in youth. 
Mr. Aleyer enjoyed the respect and esteem of all in the circle of his acquaint- 
ance, and was a man of excellent abilitv and integrity of character. He was 
an ardent Republican. He and his wife were confirmed in the German 
Lutheran church at the age of fourteen, and the family house of worship is 
at Eagle Lake, Illinois. 

MILES C. FRYSINGER. 

Miles C. Frysinger. attorney at law of Indiana Harbor, has established 
himself in this town at the beginning of his career, and as a talented young 
professional man is making his influence felt in its development and general 
progress. He has shown much ability and conscientious effort at the out- 
set of his own career as a lawyer, and his thorough training and personal 
worth are sure to be determining factors in his success and progress to 
prominence at the bar of the state and county. 

Mr. Frysinger was born in Adams county, Indiana, March 17, 1871, a 
son of Andrew J. and Phoebe (Cause) Frysinger. His paternal grand- 
father. Peter Frysinger, was born in Pennsylvania and was an early set- 
tler of Van Wert county, Ohio, where he followed the occupation of farm- 
ing and died at the age of seventy-seven years. He held various county offices. 
He was of Pennsyl\-ania Dutch stock. His wife was Catharine Bodey. and 
they had fourteen children. Grandfather Cause was a native of Virginia, 
whence he moved to Pennsylvania and later to Ohio, and died in Van Wert 
county at the age of seventy-five years. He was also a farmer. He had 
eleven children. 

iKndrew J. bVysinger, the father of Miles C, was a native of Ohio, and 
throughout his active career followed farming. He came to Indiana about 
i860, settling in Adams county. He bought and improved a farm, and died 
there in 1885 at the age of forty-four. He saw active service as a soldier 
during the last three months of the Civil war. His wife, also a native of 
Ohio, died in 1892, at the age of forty-three. They belonged to the United 
Brethren church, that denomination having the only church in their vicinity. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 459 

Tlicv weve tlic parents of fourteen children, as follows: Grant M., of Ca- 
hool, Missouri; Klell, deceased: Laura B., wife of William TI. W'inans, of 
Fort Wayne, Indiana: May R., deceased; Miles C, of Indiana Harbor; Audie, 
of Angola, Indiana; David F., of Van W^ert, Ohio; Katy E. and Minta M., 
twins, deceased: Eva and Effie, twins, the former the wife of a Mr. Davis 
of I'Virt \\"ayne. and the latter also living in l-'ort Wayne; Maggie: and 
Ivn, the wife of ^^'alker H. .Spayd of Van Wert. Ohio; Bertha L., deceased. 

Mr. Miles C. Frysinger was reared on his father's farm in Adams 
county. Indiana, securing his first education in the district schools. He later 
attended the normal school at Middlepoint, Ohio, and Valparaiso College, at 
Valparaiso, Indiana, and in 1902 graduated from the Indiana State University 
with the degree of .\. B.. and in 1903 graduated from the law department 
with the degree of LL. B. He was admitted to the bar in 1903, and in No- 
vember of the same year establi,shed his office at Indiana Harbor, where he 
has already gained considerable clientage and become identified with the pro- 
gressive interests of the town. Mr. Frysinger is a Republican in politics. 
He has fraternal affiliations with the Knights of Pythias. 

He was married to Miss Flora Wilmer, of Ironton, Ohio, October 
10. 1904. 

JOHN K. HAYDEN. 

John K. Hayden was a resident of Lake county in early pioneer days 
and is numbered among the county's honored dead. He bore his full share 
in the work of early progress and improvement and was known as a re- 
liable business man who never took advantage of the necessities of his fellow 
men in any trade transaction, but won success through unflagging industry, 
strong and commendable purpose and honorable effort. His birth occurred 
in Knox county, Ohio, on the 23d of October, 1835, and he was one of 
the thirteen children born to Nehemiah and Harriet (Kitchell) Hayden. He 
was only about a year old wdien brought to Lake county, and his boyhood 
days were passed in West Creek township. There he was reared in the 
usual manner of farmer lads, attending the district schools through the win- 
ter months, while in the summer seasons he worked at the plow or in the 
harvest field. To his father he gave the benefit of his serx'ices up to the 
time of his marriage, which important e\-ent in his life was celebrated on 
the 3d of March, 1859. He then located in Kankakee county, Illinois, near 



460 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

the boundary line of Lake county, and was there engaged in farming until 
1896, when he removed to Lowell and retired from active business life. 
He was well known as an agriculturist who conducted his farm along mod- 
ern and progressive lines, placing his fields under a high state of cultivation 
and equipping the farm with all improvements and accessories that facilitated 
its work and rendered his labor of greater value in the acquirement of a 
competence. As his financial resources increased he added to h.is landed pos- 
sessions, and at one time he owned in the neighborhood of six hundred 
and thirty acres of valuable land. The homestead farm comprised one hun- 
dred and twenty acres, and he afterward divided some of his property 
among his children. 

Mr. Hayden was united in marriage to Miss Rachel Dodge, who was 
born in West Creek township, Lake county, Lidiana, June 6, 1840. Her 
father, Henry Dodge, was a native of Vermont and died in Michigan 
in 1S79. He had removed to the west in 1837 and was one of the pioneer 
settlers of northwestern Indiana, establishing his home in West Creek town- 
ship, Lake county. He removed to Oceana county, Michigan, in 1871, and 
there passed away in 1879. His wife bore the maiden name of Lucretia De 
Gau, and was born in Canada. Her death occurred in ^Michigan in 1879. 
This worthy couple were the parents of twelve children, of whom Mrs. Hay- 
den was the second in order of birth. She has spent her entire life in Lake 
county, Indiana, and in Kankakee county, Illinois, the district separated only 
by the boundary line of the states. To Mr. and Mrs. Hayden Iiave been born 
eight children, of whom George and Willis A. are now deceased. The 
others are Robert, who is a resident of Virginia; Mary, the wife of Will- 
iam Beeman, who resides in Monticello, Indiana ; Lizzie, the wife of E. N. 
Hayhurst, of West Creek township; Alva, who is married and lives near 
Roanoke, Indiana; Ella, the wife of J. W. Diss, of Sherburnville, Illinois; 
and Jesse, of Kankakee township, Kankakee county, Illinois. 

Mr. Hayden continued to make his home in Lowell until his death, 
which occurred on the 6th of October, 1903. He was very well known in 
the county as the champion of all measures for general progress and im- 
provement. His political allegiance was given to the Republican party, and 
th.e cause of education found in him a warm friend. He took a deep interest 
in the schools and served as school director for about nine vears. Mr. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 461 

Hayden spent almost his entire life in this portion of the country and he 
possessed many sterling traits of character which gained for him warm 
personal regard and friendship. He was a devoted husband and father, a 
progressive and public-spirited citizen and one whose loss was deeply 
mourned throughout the community. 

REUBEN FANCHER. 

For a half centur}' Reuben Fancher has made his home in Lake county 
and is now living a retired life at Crown Point. He was for many years 
actively identified with agricultural interests, but now is enjoying a well 
earned rest. His birth occurred in Huron county, Ohio, on the 28th of 
April. 1834, and he comes of English ancestry. His grandfather and his 
father both bore the name of Thaddeus Fancher, and his mother bore 
the maiden name of Amy Chapman. She was born in Connecticut and 
was a daughter of Cyrus Chapman, who was also of English lineage. To 
these parents were born twelve children, of whom seven are yet living. 

Reuben Fancher, the eldest of the family, was reared in Huron county, 
Ohio, until twenty years of age, when he started out in life on his own ac- 
count and, believing that he might have better business opportunities in a 
less thickly settled district, he went to Michigan, where he attended the 
public school during the winter months. March 20, 1855, he came to Crown 
Point, and at that time his capital consisted of only forty dollars in gold, 
but he possessed a resolute and determined spirit, renting a tract of land on 
which he began farming. He also bought stock, and when his financial re- 
sources had increased to a sufficient extent he purchased eighty acres of 
land, to which he added until his farm comprised one hundred and sixtv 
acres. Subsequently he traded that for property in Crown Point and took 
up his abode in the city. For three years he served as deputy sheriff. He 
has, however, been largely engaged in dealing in farm machinery and live 
stock, but is now living a retired life, for through his perseverance and 
energy he accumulated a handsome competence that now supplies him with 
all of the necessities and many of the comforts and luxuries of life. 

In August, 1857, was celebrated the marriage of Mr. Fancher and Miss 
Mary Hawkins, who was born in New York and died in Lake county, Indi- 
ana, in 1895. They were the parents of four children, the eldest of whom 



462 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

died in infancy. The others are Wilham; IMary, the wife of E. H. Crowell; 
and Grace, at home. 

Mr. Fancher is a Repubhcan, and cast his first presidential vote for 
Fremont and afterward supported Lincoln in i860 and again in 1864. He 
has never wavered in his allegiance to the party, but has always voted for 
its presidential candidates and has put forth every effort in his power to 
promote its growth and secure its success. For thirty-five years he has been 
a member of the Masonic fraternity, and has been identified with the Lide- 
pendent Order of Odd Fellows for about the same length of time. For 
half a century he has li\'ed in Lake county, spending much of the time in 
Crown Point, and his life record is thus closely identified with the history of 
this portion of the state. He has watched the development of the county as 
it has emerged from pioneer conditions and has advanced toward its pres- 
ent progress and prosperity. His mind bears the impress of the early his- 
toric annals of northv.estern Indiana, and what to many others are matters 
of record are to him atifairs of intimate knowledge if not of personal ex- 
perience. 

Many years ago he established the important business, with its adjuncts, 
of putting down wells; an occupation still carried on by his son: and 
although nominally retired from business life, being now seventy years of 
age, he may be found quite regularly in their office on Main street, looking 
after the interests of their lousiness. The wells which they put down are 
known as tubular walls. They go down to various depths. Furnishing 
windmills and pumps is one of the adjuncts of this lousiness. 

Mr. Fancher is a believer in Christianity, a friend to Sunday schools 
and churches, and became a member of the Methodist Episcopal church 
many years ago. 

The fuller genealogic record, which in such a work as this it is desirable 
to preserve, is the following: 

1. Thaddeus Fancher was born in England in 1777. He was by trade 
a harness-maker. When a young man he came to the L^nited States and 
settled in Connecticut. He there married Sally Mead, ''a daughter of Gen- 
eral Mead of Revolutionary fame." There were of this family twelve 
children. 

2. Thaddeus S. Fancher was born in Ulster county, New York (to 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 463 

which state his father had removed in 1808), April 8, 1809. His father 
was a soldier in the American army in the war of 1812, and in 1815 visited 
the then new and truly wild region of Huron county, Ohio, to which state 
he removed with his family in Xoxemher and December of 1820, when 
Thaddeus S. was clc\en _\ears of age. The Fancher famil\- therefore were 
true pioneers of Huron county, Ohio, knowing well the experiences of a 
frontier life. Thaddeus S. Fancher was married tO' Annie M. Chapman, 
September 8, 1833. In 1894 they were "the oldest married couple in Huron 
county." 

3. Reuben Fancher. the oldest of twelve children, of whom the fore- 
going sketch iias been written, it thus appears, is a descendant of soldiers 
of the war of the Re\-olution and the war of 181 2, and of resolute and suc- 
cessful pioneers of the state of Ohio. 

P. J. KELLY. 

P. J. Kelly, who is engaged in the real estate and insurance business at 
Hobart and is also notary public, is a type of the representative business man 
whose life contains no exciting chapter or incidents, but whose record shows 
the force of consecutive endeavors supplemented by laudable ambition and 
guided b}- sound and reliable judgment. He was Iwrn in New York city 
March 4, 1841, and when but four years of age was taken to England by his 
parents, where he remained until 1864. He then returned to his native land, 
locating in Chicago, where he engaged in the grocery business at the corner 
of Randolph and State streets. In 1871 he suffered severe losses in the 
great fire which swept o\-er the city. He had nothing left but a horse and 
wagon. He lemained in Chicago, however, for about a year or until he 
had managed to earn a little money, when he again engaged in business as 
a partner of James Casey under the firm style of Kelly & Casey, at the cor- 
ner of State and Fourteenth, streets. There he remained until he came to 
Hobart, Indiana, where he was engaged in teaching school for four years, 
and was also justice of the peace and filled that position for eight years. He 
was also a railroad postal agent for eight years, running between New York 
and Buffalo, and during that time he maintained his residence in Hobart. 
He was known as one of the "short stops" of the postal service. He made 
the trip between New York and Buffalo three times a week, distributing the 



46i HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

mail from the former city west to Buffalo. The mail was distributed on 
the cars, a regular postofifice being maintained on the mail train. His con- 
tinuance in that position was from 1881 until 1889, and he never missed a 
day's service during ail that time and many times he substituted for others. 
Formerly he conducted a newspaper in Hobart for two and a half years, this 
being the first Republican journal of the town. When he left the mail ser- 
vice he was elected justice of the peace of Hobart and filled the office for 
eight years, at the end of which time he declined a renomination. He is 
now notary public and is also engaged in the real estate and insurance busi- 
ness. He is doing well in both branches and has handled many important 
real estate transfers since beginning in this line. 

In 1866 occurred the marriage of Mr. Kelly and Miss Mary E. Wilbur, 
a native of Compton. Rhode Island. They were married in Chicago, and 
traveled life's journey happily together for more than a third of a century. 
when in December, 1901, Mrs. Kelly was called to her final rest. In the fol- 
lowing July Mr. Kelly was again married, his second union being with Mrs. 
Elizabeth Butts, the widow of Frank Butts, who was formerly a prominent 
contractor and builder of Lake county, Indiana. Mr. Kelly owns his own 
residence, which is one of the attractive homes of Hobart. He is numbered 
among the representative citizens of Lake county, and is a stanch Republi- 
can, while socially he is connected with the Independent Order of Odd B'el- 
lows. He has been grand master, district deputy and chief patriarch of the 
grand encampment. For thirty-two years he has maintained his residence in 
Hobart, and throughout this period he has been noted for his reliability in 
every relation of life in which he has l^een found, whether in the govern- 
menr service or conducting private business affairs. 

EMERSOX OTTO SUTTOX. 

Emerson Otto Sutton is a representati\-e of one of the oldest and most 
representati\'e families of west Lake county, and in his life vocation of agri- 
culture and in the discharge of those responsibilities which fall to the lot 
of every substantial and public-spirited American he has shown himself a 
man of perfect integrity and solidity of character well befitting one of his 
family name. 

He was born in Rush county, Indiana. December 6, 1B59, and is the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 465 

sixth in a family of eight children, four sons and four daughters, born to 
Gabriel F. and Almeda (Hall) Sutton. Seven of these children are still 
living, named as follows : Festus, who is a jirosperous farmer and stock- 
man of West Creek township, and whose biography will Ije found on other 
pages of this history; Maggie, wife of William Smith, a retired farmer of 
Lowell : Mary, wife of Frank A. Hayden, a resident of Kankakee county. 
Illinois; John, a farmer of West Creek township; Emerson O. ; Grant, a 
farmer of Jasper count}-; and May, who resides on the old home with her 
mother and brother Otto. 

Mr. Gabriel F. Sutton, the father of this family, was a factor of great 
importance in the life of Lake county and a man whose influence will not 
soon be lost to the world in which he lived. He was born near Conners- 
ville, Indiana, and was reared to farming life and educated in the common 
schools. He was throughout life a man of sound judgment and substantial 
characTer, and was successful in whatever he undertook. He followed teach- 
ing in this state for a number of years. He was an old-line ^^'hig during 
the early part of his political career, and later upheld the banner of true 
Republicanism. He died about 1900, and his remains are interred in the 
Lowell cemetery, \\here his devoted wife and children have erected a beau- 
tiful monument sacred to his memor}-. He and his Avife were members of 
the Christian church at Lowell. He had begun life in Rush county with 
verv little capital, and at his death his estate comprised three hundred and 
twenty-five acres in Lake county and six acres in the village of Lowell, witli 
one hundred and forty acres in Jasper county, besides personal effects, and 
was valued at forty thousand dollars. The ancestry of this honored citizen is 
traced back to old England. 

Mr. Otto Sutton was reared in Lake county, receiving his education in 
the public schools, although he is indebted mainly to his own efforts and 
personal application for the training and insight into practical affairs of the 
world. He has always resided on the parental homestead, and since his 
father's death his mother and sister have continued to live with him. He 
was happily u'.arried on Christmas day of 1903 to Aliss Maggie Einspahr. 
She is a native of \\"est Creek township, and comes from one of the prom- 
inent German-American families of the township, being a lady who stands 
high in the social scale. She was educated in both the German and the Eng- 
lish languages. 



46t; HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Sutton is ji stanch Repuljlican, cast liis first vote for James A. Gar- 
field, since which time he has never faltered in his allegiance to the party. 
He has been selected as a delegate to the county conventions, and is a mem- 
ber oi the district committee. He affiliates \vith Castle Hall Lodge No. 300, 
Knights of Pythias, at Lowell. 

GABRIEL F. SUTTON. 

Gabriel F. Sutton, deceased, was born October 27, 1822, in the vicinity 
-of Connersville, Fayette county. Indiana. \\'hile he was yet in his infancy 
his parents moved to Rush countv. Indiana, where he grew to manhood. On 
January i, 1846, he was united in marriage to Almeda Hall, who survives 
him. To this union were born eight children : Festus P., !\iaggie J., Mary 
A., John H., Henry M., Emerson O., Elsworth G., and Viola i\I. With 
the exception of Henry M., who died in his infancy, all remain to mourn 
the father's loss. Brother Sutton came to Lake county. Indiana, in the year 
1862, and from that time until his death evinced the true spirit of citizen- 
ship in every detail. He united with the Christian church in early man- 
hood, and filled its pulpit very acceptably many times. He was a loving hus- 
band, a kind and indulgent father, a true friend and neighbor, a stanch 
believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, and died in peace with God, December 17, 
1899, ^t the age of seventy-seven years, one month and twenty days. His 
funeral occurred from the Christian church at Rensselaer at 11 a. m., Wed- 
nesday, December 20, 1899, Rev. A. L. Ward, pastor of the Christian 
church at Rensselaer, officiating. His mortal remains were laid away in the 
Lowell cemetery, there to rest in c|uiet slumber until the morning of the great 
resurrection. 

"Through all pain at times he'd smile. 

A smile of Heavenly birth, 
And when the angels called him home. 

He smiled farewell to earth. 
Heaven retaineth now, our treasure ; 

Earth the lonely casket kee])s, 
And the sunbeams love to linger 

Where our sainted father sleeps." 




,,#, 



..4iiti\l 







GABRIEL F. SUTTON 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 4G7 

JAMES H. LITTLE. 

James H. Little is a member of a very prominent family in the annals 
of Lake county, and is the second son of the third successive generation that 
has found lodgment and prosperous position in this county. He is a pros- 
perous agriculturist of West Creek township, in which same township he 
was born on February 27, 1863, being a son of Joseph A. Little. His 
father was one of the true, broad-minded and successful men of this county, 
and the following account gi\-es the outline of his worthy career : 

"There was joy in the home of Thomas Little on the 24th of May, 1830, 
that came not alone from the beauty of the season, but more largely from 
the fact that on that day a male child came to add the blessings of its presence 
to the family circle. The family at that time lived in \Vebster township, 
iierrimac county. New Hampshire. In accordance with the faith of the 
parents the child recei\'ed its name in connection with the ordinance of 
baptism, and for nearly two generations the name of Joseph Ames Little 
has been a synonym for industry, integrity and kindness. The young man 
came west with his parents in 1855. From that time until his death his 
home was mostly in West Creek township, Lake county. He united with 
the Presbyterian church at Lake Prairie in 1839. He was not profuse iri 
profession, but those who knew him best had strongest trust in his Chris- 
tian character. In 1859 he married !Miss Mary Gerrish. Six of their chil- 
dren sur\ive him. During the years 1886-7 '1^ ^^"'^s ^ member of the legis- 
lature of Indiana. 

"On the morning of February 19. 1892. the angel of death entered 
this home. At the call of that imperious visitor the soul that through years 
of constant suffering had grown weary of earth's sorrows left its pilgrimage 
to the rest that remaineth for the people of God. On February 22, 1892, the 
deceased was laid to rest in the Lake Prairie cemetery." 

Mr. James H. Little is classed as one of the leading agriculturists and 
stock-raisers of \\'est Creek township, and he makes a specialty of Dur- 
ham cattle. He received his education in the common schools, and was also 
a student for a short time in \\'abash College. He graduated from the 
school of agriculture in Purdue University in the class of 1890, and has 
ever since devoted himself enthusiastically and profitably to the practical 



468 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

work of farming. He is one of tlie few men Avho ha\e received special train- 
ing for the science of agricultnre, and in proportion to his advantages he has 
made his pnrsuits a means of success and profitable endeavor. His stock 
farm is a model of its kind and size. 

In June, 1894, he married Miss Bessie Spry, and three children, two 
sons and one daughter, have been born to them, all living, as follows : Joseph 
A. and Seth S., of school age, and Hester E.. the youngest of the house- 
hold. Mrs. Little was a native of the Bluegrass state of Kentucky, and was 
reared for the most part in Illinois and Indiana. She attended the State 
Normal School at Terre Haute, and for five years before marriage was a 
successful teacher, and since entering upon her domestic duties she has 
proved an equally able and worthy helpmeet to her husband. Mr. Little is 
a stalwart Republican, and cast his first presidential vote for Benjamin Har- 
rison and has always supported the principles of Republicanism. Both he 
and his wife are members of the Lake Prairie Presbyterian churcli in West 
Creek township, and he has been one of the elders and also superintendent of 
the Simday school. His wife has also taken an active part in church and 
Sup.day school work in different places, and was superintendent and a teacher 
in the Pine Grove Sunday school. Mr. Little owns four hundred acres of 
land all in West Creek township, and his residence and buildings are a 
credit to the entire township. He and his brothers, Lewis and Jesse, are 
among the foremost and most influential citizens of this county, and these 
annals would be incomplete without mention of their life and work. 

\MLLIAM N. HAYDEN. 

Emerson has said tiiat the true history of a nation is best told in the 
lives of its most prominent citizens and residents, and in Mr. William N. 
Hayden, the trustee of West Creek township and a prosperous farmer, we 
have a representative of one of the most prominent families of the county 
of Lake. He is a native of Lake county, was born May 24, 1855, and is 
the youngest of the fourteen children born to his father by two marriages, 
he being the only son and child of the second union. His parents are Ne- 
hemiah and Sarah (Smith) Hayden, and the full record of this worthy 
family in the earlier generations is given in connection with the biography 
of the elder Hayden in another portion of this volume. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 169 

Mr. Hayden was reared in Lake county and was educated in the com- 
mon schools. He was brought up to agricultural pursuits, and in the con- 
tinuation of these has made his Ijest success. His commencement in life 
was not remarkably auspicious, and possibly he and his wife had not more 
than four hundred dollars cash capital wdien they set their feet upon the 
highroad of life and began to tread their way through circumstance and 
earnest endeavor and useful purpose to a worthy and successful goal. He 
was married to Miss Maria J- Edmonds, on August 21, 1876, in Crown 
Point. They began as renters, and continued in that way until they had a 
secure start, which was not long. They then located on eight}- acres which 
they had purchased, going in delit for most of it, but their frugal industry 
and enterprise more than offset the debt. They thus began life happy but 
not full-handed, and by their continued co-operation and faithful toil from 
year to year they added to their possessions until now they own in fee simple 
two hundred and seventeen acres of fine land, all in West Creek township. 
And the best part of the record is that they have gained this property by 
their own industry and efTorts. 

Mrs. Hayden was born in Lake county, March 13, 1858, the youngest 
of the six children of Melvin and Sarah (Leffler) Edmonds. Her brothers 
and sisters are : Nelson, a resident and retired farmer of Lowell, and 
married; Nancy, who is the wife of Charles Morgan, a farmer and resident 
of West Creek township ; Charles, who was a soldier and an active par- 
ticipant in the battles of the Civil war, and is now a resident of Kansas; 
Mary, who is the wife of Wallace Hayden, a resident and retired farmer 
of Lowell ; Eli, who for many years followed farming and is now a resi- 
dent of West Creek township, and is married. Mrs. Hayden's father was 
a native of Canada, and died in 1874 at the age of sixty-three years. He 
followed farming, and in ]iolitics was a Republican. Mrs. Hayden was 
reared in Lake county and received her education in the common schools. 

To the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Hayden have been born two children, 
a son and a daughter, both living. Jodie M. is a citizen of West Creek town- 
ship and a prosperous young farmer. He married Miss Lura Pulver. He 
completed his education in the common schools of this county, had two 
years' work in the Lowell high school, and also took a business 
course in the Dixon Business College at Dixon, Illinois. For two vears he 



470 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

was telegraph operator at Lowell for the Monon Railroad. Edna S.. the 
daughter, is at home. She finished two years of high school work, and at 
the age of seventeen she took the teachers' examination and passed creditably. 
But on account of being so young she did not begin active work in the teach- 
ing profession until she was eighteen. She has taught three years in her 
home township, and has been very successful in her work. She has also 
studied music. 

Mr. Hayden is a Republican in politics, and cast his first vote for Hayes, 
having upheld his party's principles ever since. In 1899 he was elected town- 
ship trustee of West Creek township. He has the supervision of fourteen 
schools in addition to the numerous other duties of this important office. He 
has aljout seventy-five scjuare miles of territory to cover in this township, 
and he devotes himself assiduously to his administrative duties. He is a 
member of Cedar Camp No. 5155, Modern Woodmen, and has held office 
in this order. He and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal 
church at Lowell. Mr. and Mrs. Hayden are citizens of high social stand- 
ing, and it is with pleasure that this brief history of their lives can be placed 
in this genealogical record of Lake county. 

CHESTER P. PIXLEY. 

Chester P. Pixley is a member of a prominent family of the name who 
have resided in Lake county sirice the middle of last century, and whose 
identification with its industrial, social and intellectual interests has been a 
factor for progress and improvement along all lines. Mr. Pixley belongs to 
the younger class of men who have so energetically taken hold of afifairs in 
West Creek township and increased its reputation as the banner township of 
the county, and his energy and fine management have given him a large 
amrmnt of success in life. 

^Ir. Pixley was born on the old homestead in this county where he still 
resides, on October 9, 1863. His parents were ^Villiam H. and Nancy Ann 
( Scritchfield) Pixley, and he was the third in their family of ten children, 
six sons and four daughters, eight of whom are still lix'ing. as follows : 
.Alice, the wife of Charles A. Taylor, a prosperous farmer in West Creek 
township; Chester P.; Mar_\-, the wife of C. P. Edgerton, a farmer of Cen- 
ter township; Edwin, married, and a jeweler of Lowell: ]\Iartha, wife of 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. iTl 

Obediah \'innedge, of Creston. Indiana; Calvin. ;i jeweler of Lowell; Clara, 
who was educated in the Lowell high school and is a teacher in West Creek 
township; and Aliio ]M.. a salesman in F. E. Nelson's store in Lowell. 

William FI. Pixie)-, the father, was born in Lake county, Ohio. October 
lo, 1824. and died January 6. 1897. He was reared in his native state,. 
graduated from Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania, w-as a teacher 
during his youth, and spent most of his life in farming and stock-raising. 
During the fifties he and his father came to Lake county, and he and his 
father laid claim to over seven hundred acres of government land. He 
erected his home on the very farm where his son Chester now resides, and 
he lived there until his death. He was a prominent and well known man 
in the ci^mmunit}'. was noted for his fairness in all business transactions, and 
honored for his judgment and worth. He adhered to the Whig party till its 
dissolution, and from then on till his death voted mainly with the Demo- 
crats, although he supported Lincoln, and was later a warm advocate of the 
greenback principles and a great admirer of Peter Cooper. He was a prom- 
inent official in the ^Masonic fraternity at Lowell. His wife was a native of 
Kentuck}- and came to this county from her native state when about thirteen 
years old. She was one of thirteen children in the Scritchfield family, and 
one died recently at the age of seventy and ele\en are yet living, making a 
remarkable record for longevity. Both father and mother Pixley are in- 
terred in the Creston cemetery, where a monument stands sacred to their 
memory. 

Mr. Chester P. Pixley was reared in West Creek township and was 
educated in the common schools, and has made the tilling of the soil his 
chief occupation. He remained at home with his parents for some years after 
reaching his majority, and on December 6. 1899, was married to Miss Lydia 
A. Taylor. They have one little daughter, Mae Belle by name. Mrs. Pixley 
w'as born in Crown Point, Indiana, February 9. 1873. being the eldest of six 
children, three sons and three daughters, of John R. and Susan (Strong) 
Taylor. She has four brothers and sisters living : Hamlet, a farmer of 
West Creek township, and married; Maude, wife of John Wheeler, of the 
same township; John A., a farmer of West Creek township; and Cora E., 
who married William E. Schofield. of Grifiith, this county. Mrs. Pixley's 
father was born in this county March 13. 1846, was reared as a farmer and 



472 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

educated in the common schools, and is still living in the county. He was a 
member of the Twelfth Indiana Cavalry, enlisting from Crown Point for 
three years, and was in various battles and received some wounds during 
the war, being honorably discharged November lo, 1865. He is a Repub- 
lican in politics and a member of the Grand Army of the Republic at Crown 
Point. Mrs. Pixley was educated in the common schools and took three 
years in the Crown Point high school, after which she was one of the success- 
ful teachers of Lake county for six years, being a teacher in one school for 
five years. She has also taken work in music. 

After their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Pixley settled on the old Pixley 
homestead and ha\-e since made this their happy home, where they are held 
in high esteem for their social and individual worth and where they have a 
large circle of friends around them. They have one hundred acres of the 
choice land of the township. Mr. Pixley is an enthusiastic stock farmer, 
and raises som.e fine Norman Percheron horses and Poland China hogs, and 
is doing his share toward bringing the stock of the county up to higher 
standards. He is a Democrat in politics, has been a delegate to the state 
conventions, and has loyally supported the party at all times. 

JESSE LITTLE. 

Jesse Little is a scion of one of the most prominent families of West 
Creek township, and he has himself in a most commendable manner carried 
out the traditions of the family history and made his own career in the town- 
ship a conspicuous example of industry and sagacious business management 
as well as public-.spirited citizenship. 

'Mv. Little was born on the old homestead on which he still resides, in 
West Creek township, January 17, 1868, and was the fourth in the family 
of children born to Joseph and Mary (Gerrish) Little, whose history in 
detail \Aill be found rm other pages of this work. Mv. Little was reared in 
his home township, with lus early education acquired in the common schools, 
and he afterward entered Purdue University and in 1894 graduated from 
the agricultural department. He is thus a twent'eth-century farmer, one who 
believes in making the tilling of the soil a science just as the pursuit of any 
other profession, and he combines with the necessary practical experience 
and good common sense of the old-time husbandman the skill and experi- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 473 

mental knowledge derived from thorough study of all the conditions tending 
to retard or promote the success of farming. While in college he took a 
foremost part in athletics, and plaj-ed tackle on tlie Purdue football team, 
being so vigorous and well trained that he always escaped injury. 

August 28, 1898, he was married to ]\Iiss iNIartha Buchanan, and the 
two children of this marriage are Mary and Earl B. Mrs. Little was born 
in Porter county, Indiana, was educated in the high schools at Hebron and 
Crown Point, and was then a student for two years at the ladies' seminary 
at Oxford, Ohio. She was a successful teacher in Port-er and Lake coimties, 
and for two years taught in the city schools of Hammond. Her father is 
now deceased, and her mother is a resident of Hebron. 

Mr. Little is a stanch Republican, having cast his first presidential vote 
for Harrison. He has also served as a delegate from his township to the 
district convention. He and his wife are members of the Lake Prairie Pres- 
byterian church, and have always contributed to the benevolences worthy their 
consideration. He and his brother James have about one thousand acres of 
the fine bottom land of West Creek township, and he resides on and owns his 
interest in the old homestead of two hundred and forty acres. He has been 
unusually successful in raising stock, and in whatever enterprise of the char- 
acter that he has undertaken he has achieved a large measure of prosperity. 

T. A. WASON. 

T. A. W^ason is one of the prosperous farmers and stoclcnien of West 
Creek tow-nship. and during the nearly sixty years since he came into the 
world he has gained a most creditable success, has lived uprightly and on 
good terms with his fellow men, and while industriously and faithfully 
performing the duties of life he has also enjoyed the comforts and content- 
ment of a worthily lived career. 

He was born at Vevay, in Switzerland county. Indiana, September 23, 
1845, ^'id is the eldest and the only one surviving of the three children 
born to Hiram and Elizabeth (Abbott) W'ason. His parents both passed 
av,-ay in Lake county in the same year, 1898. His father was born in Hills- 
boro county. New Hampshire, and was educated for the Presbyterian min- 
istry. He was the first pastor of the Lake Prairie Presbyterian church in 
West Creek township. He was a strong Republican, and \oted for the 



474 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

first presidential candidate of that party. His wife was also a native of the 
same locality of New Hampshire. 

yiv. T. A. W'ason came with his parents to Lake county in 1857, his 
father purchasing eighty acres of land in ^^'est Creek township. He was 
educated in the common schools of the township, and was a student ni 
Wabash College in Crawfordsville for three years. He taught for two win- 
ters in West Creek township, and also passed one season in the employ of 
the Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad Company. He entered into part- 
nership with his father in farming and stock-raising, and at the present 
time he owns two hundred and sixty acres of the fine land of Lake county^ 
In 1899 he erected a beautiful brick residence on his estate, one that is a 
credit to his individual enterprise and to the entire township. 

Mr. Wason has been twice married. His first wife was Miss Julia 
Brannan. and they had one daughter, Julia B., who resides at home, and who 
has completed the common school course and was a student in the high 
school at Crown Point. Mr. Wason was bereaved of his first wife, July 17, 
1S76, and was afterward married to Miss Emma S. Peach, who was born 
in New H'ampshire but was reared in Lake county. She was a successful 
teacher in Eagle Creek township for a number of years. To this marriage 
have 1>een born three children: Henry Boyd has finished the eighth grade 
and is about to take up high school work, and he is very fond of literature as 
well as of athletics; Isabelle is also ready for high school and is also a 
student of instrumental music: Faith is in the seventh grade. Mrs. Wason, 
the mother of these children, died in May, 1894. She was a lover of home 
and a good and faithful wife, and her memory is still sacred in the hearts 
of those who were closest in friendship and ties of kindred. She was a 
member of the Lake Prairie Presbyterian church. 

]\Ir. Wason is a stanch Repulilican, and cast his first presidential vote 
for General Grant. He has had no time to accept public or official responsi- 
bilities, as his business interests have absorbed all his time. He affiliates 
with Colfa.x Lodge No. 378, of the Masons, at Lowell, and is also a mem- 
ber of the lodge of the Knights of Pythias at the same place. He and his 
family are all members of the Presbyterian church in West Creek town- 
ship. He has traveled about the country a good deal, and has visited both 
the New England states and the northwest. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 475 

FRANK RICHARDS. 

In the tillers of the soil and the garnerers of the crops have always rested 
the main strength and hope of a nation, and the substantial character of 
any community is best judged by the personnel of its farming population. 
Lake county is particularly well favored in this class of men, and among 
the more recent arrivals to swell the enterprising agricultural element is the 
solid and substantial citizen ]\Ir. Frank Richards, who is now one of the 
most active and intelligent farmers and stockmen of ^Vest Creek township. 

Mr. Richards was born in Kankakee county, Ilhnois, March 12, 1856, 
being the eldest of six children, four sons and two daughters, born to Will- 
iam C. and Mary (Campbell) Richards. He has just one brother living, 
Samuel, a resident of Valparaiso. His father was born in Onondaga county, 
New York, in 1822, and died in 1875. He was a surveyor l?y profession, 
and was educated at Elbridge .Academy. Fle also folbiwed the \'ocati<)n 
of teaching in New York, Iniliana and Illinois, and was always known for 
his superior intelligence and Iireadth of mind. He was a Republican in 
politics. His wife was a natix-e r,f Ohio, and she jjassed away in 1899. 

Mr. Frank Richards was reared on a farm, and his education has been 
mainly self-acquired, and he has been the architect of his own fortune. He 
remained with his parents, giving them his time and wages, and at the age 
of twenty-one he had just a team of horses and a plow as capital for his life 
career, so that what he has since made is the result of his own diligence and 
prudence. He has had full regard throughout life for the principles of in- 
tegrity and rectitude, and he is amply rewarded in the confidence and trust 
in which he is held by friends and business associates. He began his farm- 
ing career as a renter, and continued so for twenty-one years in the states 
of Illinois and Indiana, and during tin's time he lived comfortalilv, provided 
well for his family, and increased his store of world's profits. In 1901 he 
purchased one hundred and eighty-eight acres in West Creek and Cedar 
Creek townships, and went in debt for a large amount of the juirchase price. 
During the first year he paid fourteen hundred dollars on the place in addi- 
tion to the interest, and in a short time will own his fine propert}' free of 
incumbrance, and its possession will be a fine reward for his life of careful 



iTG HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

August i8. 1880, he was married to Miss Alice Ballou, and one daugh- 
ter, Mary Ballou, has been born to them, she now being a student in the 
Lowell high school and having taken also instrumental music. Mrs. Rich- 
ards was born in Janesville, Wisconsin, November 2. 1861, being a daugh- 
ter of Davillo and ]Mary (Cutler) Ballou. She was reared for the greater 
part of her early years in Galesburg, Illinois, and received her education in 
the city schools. 

^Ir. and Mrs. Richards located as renters in Lake county in 1888, and 
have made their home in the county ever since. The Richards family traces 
its ancestr}- back to the Plymouth Rock Pilgrims. ^Ir. Richards" father 
was an important personage, and was appointed by old Governor Richard Yates 
as a ditch or swamp land commissioner in Illinois. He was the oldest in 
a famil}^ of eighteen children, and was the best educated of them all. 

Mr. Richards is a stanch Republican, and has had no cause to falter 
in his allegiance to the party since casting his first presidential vote for 
Garfield. Fraternal!}- he is a member of the camp of the Modern \\'ood- 
men of America at Lowell. 

CHARLES A. TAYLOR. 

"Biography is the only true history," says Carlyle, and ihen the ]ihi- 
losopher Emerson further asserts that the true history of a nation is best 
told in the lives of its representative men and women, so that in detailing 
the careers of the leading citizens of Lake county its own history is like- 
wise being written. One i-ecord that will add to the completeness of this 
work on Lake county is that of Mr. C. A. Taylor and wife, who belong to 
the younger class of citizens of West Creek township and whose success in 
their life work gives them high place in the estimation of their fellow citizens. 

Mr. Taylor is a native son of this county, and was born July 16, 1857. 
being the second in a family of five children, three sons and two daughters, 
born to DeWitt Clinton and Emma L. (Palmer) Taylor. He is the oldest 
of those living; his brother Frank J., now married and engaged in stock- 
raising at Hiawatha, Nebraska, received a college education at Valparaiso 
and taught school in Lake county three or four years ; Emma, the wife of 
Martin D. Palmer, a farmer of Jennings county, Indiana, received her edu- 
cation in the Lowell high school : \\'illiam. who was educated in th.e public 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 477 

schools and at college, is married and is a farmer and butcher at Lowell. 

De^^'itt C. Taylor was horn in 1826 and died in January, 1888. He 
was reared to farm life, and his education was mainly self-acquired. He 
was a successful man, being so through the energy and forcefulness of his 
own character. During his boyhood he had attended the old log-cabin 
school. He was one of the early settlers of Lake county, and was here before 
the Indians had left their ancestral haunts. His first home was on the 
east side of Cedar lake, where he was domiciled in a log cabin for a time, 
then sold that and moved to Cedar Creek tow^nship, and afterward became 
a pioneer settler of West Creek township. He accumulated c.-er two hun- 
dred acres of fine land, and did well by his family. He cast his early votes 
for the \\'hig party, and later became one of the stanchest supporters of 
Republican principles, being a warm admirer of Lincoln. He was 
one of Indiana's brave men who went to the front during the Civil war, 
enlisting at Crown Point in the Sixty-third Indiana Infantry, along at the 
first of the war. He was first assigned to the Army of the Potomac and 
later to the Trans-Mississippi department, and he wore the blue uniform and 
continued in service until the end of the war, when he returned to peace and 
quiet labor on his own farm. His wife was born in St. Joseph county of 
this state, in 1831, and died in March, 1903. Her ancestors were early New 
Englanders, some of whom were soldiers in the Revolution, which entitles 
the Taylor family to membership in the patriotic orders of the Sons and 
Daughters of the Revolution. Both parents of Mr. Taylor are interred in 
the Creston cemetery, where suitable monuments mark their final resting 
places. , 

Mr. Charles A. Taylor was reared and educated in this county, and 
from his earliest years his training and piirsuits have been in farming and 
stock-raising. When he was twenty-three years old, on August 19, 1880, he 
was united in marriage to Miss Alice E. Pixley. They have one son, Edson 
M., who received his diploma from the grammar schools in 1903 and has 
taken one year's work in the Lowell high school. Mrs. Taylor was born 
January 20, 1861, a daughter of William H. and Nancy Ann (Scritchfield) 
Pixley, whose history will be found in connection with their son Chester 
Pixley. Mrs. Taylor was reared in this county and educated in the com- 
mon schools. She is a memljer of the Methodist Episcopal church at Creston. 



478 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

After their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Taylor began as renters in West 
Creek township, but a year later purchased sixty acres of land where they 
now Ii\'e. They went in delit for practically all of this, but their combined 
industry, economy and capaljle management have given them a beautiful 
estate in their own name, improved it immeasurably above its first condition, 
and made the Taylor farm a model of thrifty and progressive agricultural 
enterprise. They have since added forty acres to their first farm, and also 
twenty acres inherited by Mrs. Taylor. Besides their country farmstead 
they own a pretty residence property on the west limits of Lowell, and this 
they contemplate making their home. 

Mr. Ta}lor has been lo}-al and efficient in supporting the Republican 
party e\er since casting his first vote for Garfield, and has served as a dele- 
gate to the county conventions. As a resident of the banner township of the 
county he has done his share in all public works and enterprises and made 
his influence felt on the side of progress in social, moral and intellectual 
afifairs. 

\MLLIA:M H. MICHAEL. 

William H. Michael is one of the oldest living native citizens of Lake 
county, but also has many other claims to distinction in connection with his 
residence here. He is a man of much ability in the various affairs of life, 
has been prosperous in his agricultural and stock-raising enterprises, gives 
attention to religion and education in his community, and is altogether a type 
of the true American citizen, self-reliant and upright. 

He was born March 23, 1S47. ^"'^' ^^^ '^"*^' '"i'^ brother Edwin are the 
only survivors of a family of five children, four sons and one»daughter, born 
to John J. and Wealthy Ann (Green) Michael. He was reared to man- 
hood in this county, and his education was received in the country schools 
and in the excellent high school at Westville. He has always taken much 
interest in good literature, and in his home some good books will always 
be found handy with their information and culture. He was reared to farm- 
ing pursuits, and has gi\-en liis best years and efforts to that line of industry, 
with the result that he is one of the prosperous farmers of this rich agri- 
cultural county. .\s a stockman he makes a specialty of shorthorn cattle, 
and he justly takes much pride in his herd, which at present numbers fifty- 
five head of registered animals. This stock is of such high grade that a 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 479 

demand comes tor tliem from every part of the country, and he has shipped 
bv express cattle as far west as CaHfornia and as far east as Maryland. His 
estate comjjrises one iiundred and sixty-six acres of fine land in West Creek 
township, and he has a nice residence and delightful home, with all the as- 
S(xiations and surroundings capable of making him happy and contented 
with what the good world has given. 

He was with his parents until attaining his majority, and in Xo\-ember, 
1872, he was united in marriage with Miss Mary S. Morey. Five children, 
three sons and two daughters, were born to them, and the three now living 
are as follows : Loren P. is a mechanical engineer and foreman in the Big 
Four shops at ]\lount Carmel. Illinois: he was a graduate in the class of 
1896 from the engineering department of Purdue University: he is married 
and has a son, William Conrad. The second son, Herbert, graduated with 
the class of "04 in the classical course at Butler University at Indianapolis, 
/essie M., the daughter, is at home, and has received, besides a public school 
training, a musical education in a conservatory at Chicago and in Indianapo- 
lis. From this it is evident that IMr. and ]Mrs. Michael believe in gi\-ing their 
children the best of equipment for life, and the children, in turn, have proved 
the wisdom of this course liy the honorable part they have already taken in 
life's activity. 

]\Ir3. Michael was born in New Hampshire, in March, 1850. being a 
daughter of Epliraim and Susan (Peach) Morey, the former deceased and 
the latter still li\ing in West Creek township. The father of Mr. ]\Iichael 
was born in Orleans count}'. New York, in 181 1, and died in 1897. He was 
a carpenter by trade, which he followed in the early part of his life, and later 
gave his attention to farming. He was an old-line Whig', and later a Repub- 
lican, and served as justice of the peace for a number of years during the 
early history of Lake county. He came to Lake county as a pioneer in 1838, 
and his first habitation was a log house, in which his children were also born. 
He and his wife were Baptists. 

Mr. ^Michael is a stanch Republican, and since casting his first ballot 
for General Grant, the soldier president, he has been an unfaltering advo- 
cate of true Republicanism. At various times he has been selected as a dele- 
gate to district conventions of his party. He and his family are members of 
the Lake Prairie Presbvterian church, and he has aided bv his means in 



480 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

the erection and support of the church. He is a trustee and also treasurer of 
the official board. The society is in a flourishing condition, and there is a 
Sunday school with a regular attendance of forty. 

PHILIP STUPPY. 

German- American citizens have contributed more largely than any 
otiier race to the material development and progress of Lake county, and the 
thrift, honest industry and integrity which are the characteristics of the 
people as a class can nowhere be better proved than in this county. Among 
these practical and enterprising men in West Creek township should be men- 
tioned Mr. Philip Stuppy, who has lived in the county for something over a 
third of a century and from small beginnings advanced to a place of esteem 
and affluence among all his fellow men. 

He was born in Bavaria, Germany, April 20, 1845, being the second 
child of Adam and Elizabeth (Lindemer) Stupp}'. There were seven chil- 
dren, four sons and three daughters, and four others are still living 
and all residents of Germany, as follows: Mary E., wife of Mr. Kaufman, 
of Bonn, Germany, a farmer; Magdalene, wife of a Mr. Guider; Amelia, 
vidio is married : and Adam. The father of this family was also a native of 
Bavaria, was born in 1819 and died in 1862, and followed farming most of 
his life. He v.as a man of superior education, having been trained for the 
priesthood. His wife was also born in the same locality, and died when 
her son Philip was an infant. 

'Siv. Philip Stuppy was reared to farm life, and received his education 
in tlie German tongue. He is the only one of the family who decided to 
leave his fatherland and seek better opportunities in the Occident, and he 
was twenty-one when he crossed the ocean. He left the fatherland in com- 
pany with one of his comrades, on June 28, 1866, and sailed from Havre, 
France, and landed in New York. For the first four years he employed him- 
self at Scranton. Pennsylvania, accepting any work which would give him 
an honest dollar. He finally bought a piece of land in Wyoming county, 
but after a year sold and came to Lake county, arriving here in 1871. He 
purchased forty acres of land with a little house and stable and with few 
improvements. He has since added to his possessions till he is now the 
owner of one hundred and sixty-eight acres of choice land, and has one of the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 481 

model farmsteads of the entire township of West Creek. He came here 
early enough that much of the land was unimproved, and has thus witnessed 
most of the agricultural de\-elopment and material progress. 

On February 12. 1867, he was married to Miss Elizabeth Rodel. who 
became the mother of two children, a son and a daughter, the latter dying 
in infancy. The son. Philip P.. is a prosperous farmer in \Vest Creek town- 
ship. 'Sir. Stuppy lost his first wife in Pennsylvania, in September, 1870, 
and on March i. 187 1, married Miss Bridget Murphy. Three sons and 
two daughters came to this second union, and four are living: John A., 
a farmer on his father's place, completed the common schools and took the 
teacher's course in Valparaiso: Emma L.. who attended high school and 
was a teacher in her home township six years, is the wife of Lewis Belshaw, 
of \A''est Creek township: Frank M. graduated from the Lowell high school 
in 1898, attended the University of Lidiana and took a business course at 
the \'alparaiso normal, and is now a practicing attorney at Crown Point : 
Edgar T., the }oungest. was educated in the Lowell high school and is now 
a practical farmer and stockman. ^Irs. Stuppv was born in countv ]\Iayo, 
Ireland. 

Mr. Stuppy is a Democrat, but cast his first presidential vote for Grant, 
although he has since upheld the principles of the Democracy. He was 
selected as a delegate to the state convention of the party in 1896. and at 
various times has been sent to the county conventions. He was once can- 
didate for the office of county commissioner. He has always performed his 
share of the ci\'ic duties devolving upon the public-spirited man. and the 
general welfare of his community finds in him a loyal advocate. He aided 
in the erection of the JNIetliodist Episcopal church at Creston, and has duly 
proportioned his time and energies toward all proper enterprises, social, 
intellectual and personal. 

CYRUS HAYDEX. 

Cyrus Hayden was born in Lake county over sixty years ago. to be 
exact, on the 24th of September, 1843, ^o that he is among the oldest of the 
native born citizens of the county. He has spent the adult years of his life 
in useful activity in farming pursuits, and from an impecunious beginning 
has. by his constant industry and sagacious management, acquired a measure 

31 



482 HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 

of success such as to place him among the truly representative men of the 
county. 

He was the youngest of thirteen children, eight sons and five daugh- 
ters, whose parents were Nehemiah and Harriett (Kitchell) Hayden. Six 
of this family are still living, and all residents of Lake count}'. The Hay- 
den family long since gained the reputation of being one of the most pro- 
gressive in the w^est part of the county. The parents migrated out to this 
part of northwest Indiana when the country was all a wilderness, without 
railroads, and everything in the primitive condition of unsettled regions. 

Mr. Cyrus Hayden was reared to farm life, and has from boyhood 
known the details of farming and stock-raising. He is one of the citizens 
of West Creek township who in their childhood attended the old log-cabin 
school-house. The school was located a little north of the Hayden home- 
stead, on section 12 of West Creek township, and the size of the building 
was about fourteen by sixteen feet, with one or two rough windows, and a 
wood-stove to furnish heat. He sat on a slab seat supported by wooden 
legs, and when he became classed with the older boys and girls he used 
as a desk the slanting board that ran nearly around the room and rested 
on pins driven into the wall. His pen was a gooseciuill, fashioned into the 
necessary shape by the schoolmaster. From the conditions of which this 
school was a representative Mr. Hayden has seen Lake county pass through 
a most wonderful period of development, witnessing when a email boy the 
advent of the railroad and then the many other concomitants of rising civiliza- 
tion, until be now lives in a county that is among the most highly im- 
proved of the middle west and contains all the arts and indu?tries and in- 
stitutions of twentieth century life. 

He remained at home until he was fifteen years old, when his father 
died, and he then lived with his brothers for three years. When he was 
ready to begin on his own account all he had was a team, so that he has 
risen from the very bottom of the ladder. In his early days he has raked 
the grain after the old-fashioned cradle, and has seen the hay cut down 
with a scythe. It is a well remembered event when the first reaper came 
into liis neighborhood, and with that machine it was necessan- to rake the 
"•rain bv hand off the platform, and the reaper could also be used as a mower. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 483 

He has thus been intimately acquainted with all the improvements in agri- 
cultural processes as they ha\-e been introduced. 

During the war ]\Ir. Hayden offered his services to the Union cause, 
enlisting in Kankakee county, Illinois, in Company K, One Hundred and 
Thirteenth Illinois Infantry. He joined his regiment at Memphis, and was 
then assigned to duty in the trans-Mississippi department. He did guard 
and patrol duty, and got as far south as New Orleans. He was still in the 
service when the glad news of Lee's surrender came, followed five days later 
by the distressing tidings of Lincoln's assassination. He received his honor- 
able discharge at Chicago, and then returned home to take up his duties as 
a peaceful citizen. 

September i, 1864, he was married to Miss Caroline Cleaver, and five 
children, two sons and three daughters, were born to them, three of the 
children being stiU living: Myrtie, the wife of William Einspahr. a farmer 
of West Creek township, finished the public school work and took instruc- 
tion in music. Thuel A. was educated in the country schools and the Lowell 
high school, and prepared himself for teaching, which profession he followed 
verv successfully in this county, having taught in his home township for 
four years; he is now a successful farmer of West Creek township, and 
married Miss Minnie Shirley, an old soldier's daughter, and they have a son, 
Hugh. ]Mamie, the youngest, is at home, and she graduated f!(jm the public 
schools in 1904 and has also taken music. Mrs. Hayden was born in Yel- 
lowhead township, Kankakee countv, Illinois, June 15, 1846, and was the 
second of five children born to W'oster D. and Eliza A. (Sargeant) Cleaver, 
four of the family being alive at the present writing and residents of Lake 
county. Mrs. Hayden was reared and educated in Illinois and was a teacher 
in her nati\e county for three years. Her father was born in Connecticut. 
April 7, 1816, and died November 2S. 1867. He was a carpenter and joiner 
by trade. In young manhood he came to Illinois, where he resided till his 
death. He was a strong Republican in politics. He and his wife were 
members of the Christian church. His wife was born in Fotmtain county. 
Indiana, December 31, 1825, and passed away August 14, 1897. 

During the first year of their married life Mr. and ]\Irs. Hayden were 
tenant farmers in Yellowhead township of Kankakee county. He then 
purchased eighty acres in West Creek township of this county, and this 



484 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

land was the nucleus around which they liave since built up their fine estate. 
Their first eighty was in the condition of nature, and it was by his persever- 
ing labor that it became such a profitable piece of agricultural land. There 
was a lone burr-oak tree on the place, and it stood for many years as a natural 
guide-post to the traveler across the prairie, being finally cut down by Mr. 
Havden in the spring of 1904. His first home was a little frame building, 
and the barn was small and roofed with hay. But the days of early struggle 
and hard labor have given place to comfortable circumstances, and Mr. and 
Mrs. Hayden now look out upon a beautiful estate of three hundred and 
forty acres, all of which is in \\'est Creek township with the exception of 
five acres in Cedar Creek. They have a nice country residence, and they take 
much satisfaction in the knowledge that their possessions are the result of 
their own Avork. Mr. Hayden is a Simon-pure Republican, and has cast his 
ballot for the presidential candidates from Lincoln down. 

BENJAMIN L. P. BELL. 

Benjamin L. P. Bell, chief of the Hammond fire department, has had a 
career in this important branch of public service lasting over fifteen years, 
both in the employ of a private concern and with the municipality. The fire- 
man does more for the conservation of property than any other individual, 
and he has a proportionately high regard in the public favor and esteem. 
Heroes are discovered every day in this liranch of municipal service, yet their 
quiet performance of duty goes on without interruption and their deeds often 
fail of casual mention in the press. The Hammond fire department has 
developed and maintains as high a state of efficiency as that of the near-by 
city of Chicago, and takes rank among the best of the state, so that Mr. 
Bell occupies both an honorable and a responsible position in the city of 
his choice. 

Chief Bell was born in Chicago, Illinois, No\-eml)er 14, 1849, a son of 
Joshua and Hannah (Weaver) Bell, the former a native of Ireland and the 
latter of New York state. His grandfather, also Joshua Bell, was of Scotch 
ancestry, but was born, lived and died in Ireland, having been the father of 
several children. The younger Joshua Bell emigrated from Ireland in 1819, 
and became a shoe merchant in Montreal, Canada, where he lived until the 
rebellion in 1836. He then came to Chicago, in the early period of th.at 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 485 

city"'; liistory. and remained there till his death in 1875. when he was eighty- 
four years old. His wife. Hannah Bell, was one of a good-sized family of 
children born to Benjamin and Phoebe (Paddock) Weaver, the former of 
whom was a native of Onondaga county, New York, was a farmer, and 
lived to be over ninety years old. Mrs. Hannah Bell survived her hus- 
band until 1883, being sixty-three years old at the time of her death. She 
had come to Chicago in 1833, when the Indians still made it their haunt. 
Both she and her husband were Protestants. They had four children, three 
sons and one daughter: Joshua, of Chicago: Kossuth H., of Chicago: Ben- 
jamin, of Hammond: and Grace, deceased, who was the wife of Henrv F. 
Schiefer, who is also deceased. 

!Mr. Benjamin L. P. Bell was reared in Chicago, attending the public 
schools, and later took a course in Bryant and Stratton"s Business College. 
He learned the plumber's trade, and followed that for a number of years 
in Chicago. Fie came to Hammond in 1889 to take the position of fire mar- 
shal for the Hammond Packing Company, and two years ago was appointed 
to the office of fire chief of the city fire department. 

Mr. Bell was married August 6, 1890, to Miss Agnes Henrietta Hob- 
man, a daughter of Ernest W. and Caroline (Sibley) Hohman. who were 
the first settlers of the original town of Hammond, and whose six children 
are still living. Four children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Bell, Fred J.. 
Grace Lena, Alice and Gladys Hohman Bell. Fred J. and Alice both died 
when about a year old,- and the other two are in school. They reside at 2']() 
South Hohman street, where Mr. Bell built a good home in 1898. Mr. 
and Mrs. Bell are members of the Episcopal church, and he affiliates with 
Garfield Lodge No. 569, F, & A. ]M.. and with Hammond Commandery 
No. 41, K. T. He is a strong Republican in politics. 

\\TLLIA^I T. DICKINSON. 

\\'illiam T. Dickinson is so well known as a worthy citizen of West 
Creek townsliip as to need hardly any introduction to the readers of this 
volume. He has spent all his life in the count}-, antl in farming and stock- 
raising has found the proper sphere for the successful direction of his ener- 
gies, but in addition is also a public-spirited man and willing to serve the 
common weal wherever possible. 



486 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

He was born in Lake county, July 26, i860, and is the sixth of nine 
children, six sons and three daughters, born to Thomas and Rachel (Miller) 
Dickinson. Of this family the six yet living are as follows : Minerva, wife 
of E. L. Watson, a farmer of Cedar Creek township ; Susie, widow of G. H. 
Baker and a resident of Lowell; William T. ; S. E., a farmer of Cedar Creek 
township, and married; P. B. and E. G., residents also of Cedar Creek 
township. 

Thomas Dickinson, the father, was born in Yorkshire, England, De- 
cember 30, 182 1, and died December 16, 1892, and followed farming during 
most of his career. When about eight years old he accompanied his mother 
to America, the voyage being made on a sailing vessel and being protracted 
forty days on account of storms. For three years he and his mother lived 
in Philadelphia, and then moved to Ohio, where he lived until the spring 
of 1 86c, when he came to Lake county and took up his residence on a tract 
of land two miles south of Lowell. He was reasonably successful in his 
life work, and was held in high esteem by his fellow men. He always sup- 
ported the Republican party until his death. He was a member of the Odd 
Fellows lodge at Lowell for many years before his demise. He was bap- 
tized in the Established Church of England. Rachel, his wife, was born in 
Ohio in February, 1825, and is now living at a very advanced age in Cedar 
Creek township, being a ver\- bright old lady. 

TMr. William T. Dickinson was reared to the life of farming. After 
completing the work of the common schools he took a literary course at 
Valparaiso College, and also taught a year in West Creek township. His 
first purchase of land was eighty-six acres at his present place, which he has 
since increased to ninety-four acres. He keeps his farm in fine condition, 
and has a \'ery comfortable residence and all necessary improvements. 

October 3, 1881, he was married to Miss Lida Miller, and three sons 
were born to them, one of them now being deceased. Thomas A. is a boy 
who has shown unusual talent in school work and made remarkable advance- 
ment. He completed the common school course of study on April 29. 1898, 
when he was twelve years old, then took three years' high school work in 
the Lake Prairie high school, and in 1902 graduated fn^m the Lowell high 
school, at the age of sixteen. He entered Purdue L'niversity as a student, 
but after two months was compelled to forego his further education for the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 487 

present on account of failing health. The younger son, Qiarles E., gradu- 
ated from the common schools May 9, lyoi, and is now a student in the 
LoA:"ell high school. The parents may be very proud of what these youths 
have accomplished in their preparation for life's duties, for they have shown 
capacity and industry which will at some day rank them among the suc- 
cessful men of the world. 

Mrs. Dickinson v>-as born in Kankakee county, Illinois, April 10, 1863, 
and was reared in that county and in Iroquois county. Her parents were 
Uriah and Catharine (Jones) Miller, and of the four children in the fam- 
ily, ilrs. Dickinson has two brothers living: John A.. whO' is a generai 
merchant at Pittwood, Illinois, and Charles U., a resident of Lowell, 
Indiana. 

Mr. Dickinson and his wife spent the first two years of their married 
life on his father's farm in Cedar Creek township, and lie then located on his 
present place. He had to begin in the world without capital, and it has been 
through industry, careful economy and wise management that he and his 
wife have made for themselves a comfortable home and pleasant surround- 
ings. Mr. Dickinson has supported the Republican party since his first 
vote went for Blaine, and he has at various times been selected as a delegate 
to county and district conventions of his party. He has fraternal relations 
with the Masonic lodge No. 378, at Lowell, and with Camp No. 5500 of 
the Modern \\'oodnien at the same place. Both he and his wife are members 
of the Christian church at Lowell. 

FRANK B. PLUMMER. 

Frank B. Plummer conies from one of the best known and most prom- 
inent families identified with the business and agricultural industries of 
Lake county. He has spent practically all his acti\e career in this county, 
and in connection with farming, and has been prosperous in material afifairs 
and a leading and influential spirit in civic and social matters. 

He was born in this county January 16, 1857, and is the eldest of three 
children born to Abiel and Kate (Baughman) Plummer, a detailed history 
of the father beirig given place on other pages of this volume. He has one 
brother living, Edwin, who is a resident of Chicago' and employed in the 
iMasonic Temple. 



488 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

j\[r. Plumnier passed his early }-ears in Lake county, and in addition 
to the course at the common schools he attended the high school at Fisher- 
ville, New Hampshire. All his active career has been spent as a farmer and 
stockman, and with the exception of two years in Kansas his work has been 
con.lned to this county, ^^'hen he made his start in Kansas he had very 
little capital, and his own intelligent management and industry have been 
the principal factors in bringing him success. 

In September, 1881. he was married to Miss Lizzie Alexander, and of 
this happy marriage two daughters have been born. Blanche, the elder, is 
in the eighth grade of school and has also taken music : Beulah will graduate 
with the class of 1905 from the Lowell high school. Mrs. "Plummer was 
born in Mifflin county, Pennsyh'ania, in September. 1867. and was reared 
and educatetl in her native state. Her mother is still living in Pennsylvania, 
but her father is deceased. She has been a true and worthy helpmate of her 
husband, and is a lady of many social attractions and gracious and kind- 
hearted at home and abroad. 

After his marriage Mr. Plummer located in Lake county and began 
farming". He now has charge of about a section of fine land in West Creek 
township, and in i8g6 he erected a beautiful country residence cin the estate. 
He gives especial attention to the raising of stock, and has some fine regis- 
tered Galloway cattle and Poland China hogs. He has voted for Republican 
principles and candidates since the time of Garfield. He and his wife are 
adherents of the Lake Prairie Presbyterian church, and stand high in the 
social circles of the township. 

ARIEL G. PLUMMER. 

Abiel G. Plummer has been a citizen of Lake county since the years 
1852, for over half a century, and he thus belongs to the pioneer class of the 
citizens of the county and state. It was a matter of great pleasure to his 
manv friends throughout tlie countv that he was able recentlv to celebrate 
his eightieth birthday, and be has li\-ed this long life so usefully and worthily 
that he is venerated and held in the highest esteem by all who know him. 

He is a native of New England, and was born in the state of New 
Hampshire, May 24, 1824. He is of true colonial stock, and it is related that 
the earliest progenitor of the Plummer family was Francis Plummer, who 




Uj 



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,JL.JS<PA. 



«.^.-t-^**^'Z- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 489 

came from England in the year 1633. only thirteen years after the advent of 
the Pilgrim Fathers upon the shores of Xew England. Abiel G. is the only 
son and the second of the five children born to Ephraim and Lucy (Gerrish) 
Plummer. His sisters are all living. ^lary, the oldest, is the widow of Henrj' 
Docige, a former agriculturist at Webster. Xew Hampshire, and she has three 
daughters living: Priscilla, the widow of Luther Gage, is a resident of Pen- 
nicoke. Xew Hampshire. Helen is also a resident of Pennicoke; and Frances, 
widow of Albert Reed, lives in Jersey City. 

Ephraim Plummer. the father of this long-lived family of children, 
was bom in Boscawen. Xew Hampshire. August 29. 1793. and died 
July 20. 1872. his birth ha\"ing occurred six years before the death of 
George Washington. He was a farmer and received a meager education. 
His home was near that of the celebrated Daniel Webster. He espoused the 
cause of the ^^'hig party until it was merged with the stronger Republican 
organization, which he supported until his death. Both he and his wife were 
members of the Congregational society of which the Rev. Dr. W'ood was 
pastor for half a century. His wife was also a native of the same part of 
X'ew Hampshire as her husband, and at her death on March 29, 1879, she 
was seventy-five years and six months old. 

Mr. Abiel G. Plummer was reared in his native state and had only a 
common school education, which was much supplemented and rounded ofif 
by the subsequent practical experience of life. He had early become ac- 
quainted with farming in all its phases, and when he reached his majority he 
began on his own account with only his energy and industry as his capital. 
^^'hen he was twenty-four years old he concluded to come west and lay the 
foundation of his substantial career, and he made the journey to Niles. Michi- 
gan, partly by rail, partly through the Erie canal and partly by the lakes. His 
first wages in Michigan were a dollar a day for hard manual labor, and while 
he was getting started he was always willing to do any work that would 
afford him an honest living. Li 1852 he came to locate permanently in ^^'est 
Creek township. Lake count}-. In the preceding year he had bargained for 
three quarter sections of land in this township, and this was the land upon 
which he worked and wrought so as to bring him his present easy circum- 
stances. 

;Mr. Plummer has some old parchment deeds which are valuable sou- 



490 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

venirs in his liousehold and interesting relics of the past. One was executed 
April I, 1843, and signed by President Tyler, another was signed by President 
Polk and executed December i, 1848, and of the same date and signature are 
two others. There are only a few of these documents in the county, and 
they are therefore the more precious as heirlooms and antiquities. 

When Mr. Plummer came to this township Lowell contained but two 
houses, and there was not a railroad in the entire county, now so crossed 
and recrossed by great trunk lines. His first home was a little plank house, 
and in the early days he has seen as many as fifteen deer at one time on his 
premises. The old Indian trail led across his land, and wolves were still 
plentiful. He has thus witnessed all the great development that has trans- 
formed this countrv so wondrously in the past half century. He used to 
drive into the city of Chicago when the stockyards were located on the Lake 
shore. One of his greatest pioneer accomplishments in this county was the 
breaking of three hundred and twenty acres of virgin prairie with ox teams. 

June 5, 1855, he was united in marriage with Miss Kate Baughman, and 
three sons were born to them, Frank and Edwin living at the present time, 
and elsewhere in these pages will be found the personal history of Mr. Frank 
Plummer, who manages the old homestead. Mrs. Plummer was born in New 
Philadelphia, Ohio, June 9, 1832, being one of the ten children, five sons and 
five daughters, born to Jacob and Sallie (Ritter) Baughman. She has a 
sister and three brothers still living : Barbara, who is the widow of Edward 
Kniselv, of Lowell; John, who is a carpenter and joiner by occupation and a 
resident of Arlington, Washington; Jacob, a retired farmer of Lowell; and 
Jav D., who is a farmer at Jackson, Minnesota. Jacob Baughman, Mrs. 
Plummer's father, was born in Pennsylvania of old Pennsylvania German 
stock, on February 9, 1798, and died October 4, 1853, in Lake Prairie, this 
county. He was a farmer by occupation. His wife was born in Pennsyl- 
vania, April 30, 1799, and died in West Creek township of this county. She 
was a memljer of the Evangelical church. Mrs. Plummer was reared in 
Ohio until she was seventeen years old, and received her education in that 
state. She came with her parents to Porter county, Indiana, in 1849. She 
is a kind-hearted and genial lady, and in many ways has smoothed out the 
rough places where family and friends were treading. She and her husband 
have together traveled life's journey for forty-nine years, and it is the hope 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 491 

of all their numerous friends that they will the next year celehrate their golden 
wedding. 

Mr. and ^Irs. Plunimer hegan their wedded life in West Creek town- 
ship and continued in the pursuits of agriculture there for many years. In 
1901 they moved into the town of Lowell, and there live a retired and peace- 
ful life. Mr. Plummer owns about seven hundred acres of land in West 
Creek township, and his career of industry and honest dealing has brought 
him comfortable circumstances. He is a stanch Republican, and began casting 
his ballot for president when the Whig candidate, Zachary Taylor, ran for the 
ofifice. He has voted for all the Republican nominees from Lincoln down, 
and has served as a delegate to the county convention. Mrs. Plummer is a 
member of the Evangelical church. 

JOHX E. LOVE. 

John E. Love, cashier of the State National Bank at Lowell, has also 
been identified with farming interests, with educational work and with hay 
and grain dealing in this place, and is a successful business man of marked 
enteriirise and energy, whose ready recognition of opportunity has l^een one of 
the salient features m his successful career. He was born in Detroit, Michi- 
gan, April 16, 1854, and is a son of Samuel and Ellen J. (Mundall) Love, 
both of whom were natives of Belfast, Ireland. The father was reared in the 
place of his birth and became a weaver. In 1852, however, attracted by the 
business possibilities of the new world, he crossed the Atlantic to America and 
located at Washington Island, W'isconsin. He came to Lake county in 1870, 
and his last davs were spent in Leroy, Indiana, wdiere he died in 1902, when 
about seventy-one years of age, his birth having occurred in 1831. His 
widow- still survdves him and now resides in Leroy, Winfield township. 

John E. Love was the second child and eldest son in their family of eight 
children. He was born in April, 1854, and in 1854 his parents removed to 
Washington Island, Wisconsin, where he was reared, pursuing his education 
in the public schools. He remained at home until twenty-four years of age, 
and at the age of nineteen years he began teaching school, which profession 
he followed through the winter months, while in the summer seasons he 
assisted his father in the work of the home farm. In 1870 he came to Lake 
county, Indiana, and here engaged in farming and in teaching school for 



492 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

about ten years. In 1880 he built a bay barn and elevator at Creston, Lake 
county, wbicb be .still operates. In 1893, bowever. be remo\-ed to Lowell and 
was engaged in dealing in hay alone in this place until 1900, when he ad- 
mitted A. S. Hull to a partnership under the firm style of LoA-e & Hull, a 
relation that is still maintained. The firm does an excellent business, making 
large purchases and sales and their enterprise has l)ecome a profitable one. 
In February, 1903, Mr. Love was elected cashier of the State National Bank 
and is thus actively connected with financial interests of the county. He also 
has valuable real estate in Lake county, Indiana, and Fayette and Clayton 
counties, Iowa. His business interests and his property holdings are the visi- 
ble evidence of his life of thrift and industn,-. 

On the 19th of June, 1878, Mr. Love was united in marriage to Miss 
Martha E. Jones, a daughter of Perry and Mary (Gilson) Jones, who were 
early settlers of Lake county, prominent and influential here. Mrs. Love 
was born in Cedar Creek township, February 22. 1862, attended the iiublic 
schools of the county, and also continued her studies in a private school at 
Crown Point under the management of Miss Martha Knight. Five dauglv 
ters ha\-e Ijeen liorn of this marriage, but the eldest, Rosa, is now deceased. 
The others are: Mollie, Ina, Grace, Mal>el. Bessie May and Alice Edith. 

In his political views INIr. Love is an earnest Republican, keeping well 
informed on the questions and issues of the day and giving unfaltering sup- 
port to the principles of the party. He served as township trustee from 1S95 
until 1900 in Cedar Creek township. He is also well known in ^Masonic 
circles, belonging to Colfax Lodge No. 378, F. & A. M., of which he has 
been secretary for twenty years. He is likewise a member of the Knights of 
Pythias Lodge No. 300, at Lowell, Indiana, of which be is one of the trustees, 
and he holds membership relation with the Independent Order of Foresters 
of America. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, in which 
he has filled various ofiices. His nature is kindly, his temperament jovial 
and genial, and his manner courteous. He has steadily advanced in those 
walks of life demanding intellectuality, business ability and fidelity, and to-day 
be commands the respect and esteem of all of those with whom be has been 
associated in liusiness or social relations. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 493 

ALEXANDER E. AYERS. 

Alexander E. Avers is a recent addition to the already fine personnel 
of Lake county citizens, and his energetic character and successful prosecu- 
tion of his husiness aflairs make him a valued factor in the material and 
civic progress and prosperity of the county. He has been in the county for 
the past three years, and is already well known throughout the township of 
West Creek. 

He was born in Shelby county. Ohio, December 15, 1847, '^''"^1 is the 
seventh of eight children, four sons and four daughters, born to Alexander H. 
and Julia (House) Avers. He has two brothers still li\-ing. Michael, now 
a resident of Lake county, was a soldier for four years in the Civil war, was 
under fire for one hundred days during the Atlanta campaign imder Sherman, 
then was on the march to the sea, was wounded at Stone River. December 
31, 1862, being struck in the hips: at Marietta, Georgia, was struck on the 
head by a piece of shell, and received his honorable discharge at Louisville, 
July 17, 1865. Samuel is a retired farmer of Heyworth, Illinois, and is a 
man of family. 

The father of this family was born in Butler county, Ohio, December 
12, 1812, and died December 20, 1885. He was reared and educated in his 
native county, and throughout life was a great reader and profound thinker. 
He was an active Whig and later an ecjually ardent Republican, and cast 
his votes for the candidates of the party from Fremont until his death. He 
canie out to Woodford county, Illinois, in 1865, and lived there the greater 
part of his remaining years. He was a Universalist in religion, and his wife 
was inclined to the Methodist faith. The ancestry of the Ayers family is 
traced to the French. Julia Ayers, the mother of Mr. Ayers, was born in 
Butler county. Ohio, September 15, 1810, and died in 1897, December 21, 
being then eighty-seven years of age. 

Mr. Alexander E. Ayers accompanied his parents to Woodford county. 
Illinois, in 1865. He is in the main a self-educated man. He lived with and 
took care of his parents for many years. He has been married twice. His 
first wife died without issue, and on February 25. 1885, he married Miss Alice 
V. DeBolt, who became the mother of eight children, si.x of whom are still 
living: Arthur H.. who has reached the eighth grade in his school work; J. 
Emerson, who is a bright lad in the eighth grade of school, with an especial 



49i HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

fondness for mathematics and history: N. Gny. who has received his diploma 
from the eighth grade: Ava Ray: H. Bernard, wlio is in the fifth grade: and 
Frank Leslie, the baby of the family. Mrs. Ayers was born in Woodford 
county. Illinois, October 5. i860, and is the oldest of the three children and 
the only daughter born to John and Eliza J. (Drake) DeBolt. One brother 
is living. John jNL. a successful grain merchant at El Paso. Illinois. Her 
father was born in Greene county. Pennsylvania, Januar\' i. 1830, and died 
July 28. 1898, at the age of sixty-eight. He was a farmer and went from 
Pennsylvania to Virginia, where he was reared. In 1857 he located and pur- 
chased land in Woodford county. Illinois, near El Paso. He was a strenuous 
Jackson Democrat in politics, and was a man of broad intelligence and ability. 
He was a member of the Christian church at the time of his death. His wife 
was a strong Methodist, and she was a bright and intelligent lady. Mrs. 
Ayers is a lover of the choicest literature, and she finds books to be her best 
companions. She is an ardent Methodist, antl joined a class of one hundred 
and twenty-one under Rev. Milsap. 

Mr. Ayers owned fifty acres of excellent land in Woodford county, and 
resided there until March i. 1902. when he purchased and removed to his 
fine estate of bottom land in \\'est Creek township, consisting of four hundred 
and fifty-five acres, on which he has already placed many valuable improve- 
ments and which in time will lie one of the model farms of the county. He 
is very much interested in stock-raising, and keeps some fine grades on his 
place. He is a Republican in politics, and has supported the candidates since 
casting his first vote for General Grant. He holds in the highest respect the 
tenets of Christianity, and for himself has tried to guide his path according 
to the golden rule. Durin.g their short residence he and his wife ha\e gained 
the confidence and high regard of all with whom they have become asso- 
ciated in Lake county, and are people of the best personal worth and char- 
acter. 

HON. WILLIAISI H. RIFENBURG. 

Hon. \^■illiam H. Rifenburg, so prominent in the ranks of the citizens 
of Hobart, was born in the town of Summit. Schoharie county, New York, 
October 22, 1834. His grandfather, Henry Rifenburg, was born in Columbia 
county. New York, near Poughkeepsie, and was a farmer and a contractor 
by occupation, having assisted in the building of the Erie canal. His father, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 495 

also named Heniy, was born along the Hudson, and was the son of an emi- 
grant from Holland, the family being a sturdy New York Dutch stock. 
Aaron Rifenburg, the father of our Hobart citizen, was a nati\e of Schoharie 
county, and was reared and educated there and became a farmer. He passed 
away at the advanced age of eighty-eight years. His wife was Mary Banks, 
and she died when about forty-five years of age. Her father, William Banks, 
was a native of the same portion of New York state as the other members of 
the family, and was of Holland Dutch descent. Aaron Rifenburg and wife 
had seven children, and all reached adult age except one. 

Hon. William H. Rifenburg. the eldest of the family, was reared in 
New York, received his education in the common schools, and at the age of 
twenty went west to Allegan county, Michigan, where he spent one year. He 
came to Lake county in 1856, among the early settlers, and for a while clerked 
in a store. He bought a farm in Hobart township, and was engaged in farm- 
ing until the Ci\'il war. In 1861 he enlisted in Company E of the famous old 
Ninth Indiana Infantry, and served as a private and second sergeant. At the 
battle of Shiloh he was wounded in the shoulder, and in the following August 
received his honorable discharge. On returning to Hobart he embarked in 
the mercantile business, and from then until 1892 was concerned in various 
enterprises. In the latter year he began contracting, and did some important 
work in that line. In 1897 he was elected to the state legislature from Lake 
county, and his Republican constituents returned him for two years, his record 
at the state capital being in every way creditable. He served as trustee of his 
township for two years, 1864-65, and held the office of justice of the peace 
from 1864 to 1868. He is a charter member and was the first commander 
of Hobart Post No. 411. G. A. R. During his legislative career he was chair- 
man of the prison committee north, and it was largely due to his influence 
that the Michigan City penitentiary was rebuilt, the contract system of prison 
labor abolished, and the indeterminate sentence law passed. He is also recog- 
nized as the father of the present gravel road system of Indiana. 

In 1859 ^Ir. Rifenburg married Rebecca Stearns, and of this marriage 
there is one daughter, Mary, now the wife of John J. W'ood. In 1866 Mr. 
Rifenburg was married to Anna Howe, by whom there are no children living, 
and in 1869 he married Miss Sabrina Sawyer. They ha\e three li^•ing chil- 
ren: Grace, the wife of Joseph H. Conroy, whose history is given on another 



490 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

page: Alaude, the wife of Elmer Armet, an official at the Alichigan City 
prison : anil Ruth, single. 

Mr. Rifenbnrg affiliates with the ]\I. L. McClellan Lodge No. 357, of 
the Masonic Order, at Hobart, and is a member and a trustee of the L^nitarian 
church. 

EDGAR HAYDEN. 

Edgar Hayden, after long years of active connection with agricultural 
interests, is now living a retired life in Lowell and belongs to a family of 
prominence in the county — a family that has taken a very active and helpful 
]:)art in the work of public progress and impro\'ement. He was born in ^^'est 
Creek town.ship. October 16, 1840, and in a family of thirteen children is the 
eleventh in order of birth. His parents are Nehemiah and Harriet (Kitchell) 
Hayden, and the family history is given in connection with the sketch of 
Joseph Hayden on another page of this volume. 

No event of special importance occurred to vary the routine of farm life 
for Mr. Hayden in his youth. In his boyhood he pursued his education in a 
log schoolhouse, which had a puncheon floor and was seated with slab benches. 
Lie attended through the winter months, and when spring came he assisted 
in the work of plowing and planting in the fields, continuing their cultivation 
until after crops were harvested in the late autumn. He started out to earn 
his own living when a mere boy, working by the month as a farm hand, and 
thus he was employed until 1861, when he was married and began farming 
on his own account. He secured as a companion and helpmate for life's 
journey Miss Rachel Knisely, a sister of the wives of Jacob and Lewis 
Hayden. She was born in New Philadelphia, Tuscarawas county. Ohio. 
February 16, 1841, and is the third in a family of five daughters. 

The young couple began their domestic life in Yellowhead township, 
Kankakee county, Illinois, just across the state line that divides Illinois and 
Indiana. His barn, however, was located in Lake county, while the house 
stood in Kankakee county. Mr. Hayden was there engaged in farming for a 
quarter of a century, and during that period he transformed his land into 
very arable and productive fields, making his property one of value and also 
of attractive appearance. When twenty-five years had passed he put aside 
farm labor and took up his abode in Lowell. He at one time had two hundred 
and sixtv acres of land, but lias since sold one hundred acres, and he now 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 497 

rents the remainint^- quarter section. His first purchase of land comprised 
sixty-five acres, for wiiich he paid fifteen dollars per acre, and the greatest 
price which he ever paid was thirty-se\-en dollars per acre. He sold one hun- 
dred acres in October, 1903. for one hundred dollars per acre, a fact which 
indicates how well he had improved the property. He began life a poor man, 
but by his own energy and unflagging perseverance, supplemented by the 
assistance of his estimable wife, he has become the owner of a valuable farm 
and is to-day enjoying the fruits of his former toil in a comfortajjle home in 
Lowell, his competence being sufficient to enalile him to surround himself and 
family with the necessities and many of the comforts and luxuries of life. 

To Mr. and Mrs. Hayden have been born two children, Nellie, who is now 
the wife of Charles Beebe, who is living a half mile west of Lowell upon a 
farm in West Creek township; and Seigel, who resides in Lowell. 

Mr. Hayden is numbered among the honored pioneer settlers of Lake 
county. The family was established here in 1837, and since that time has 
been closely identified with the improvement and upbuilding of the county. 
In tlie family were eight sons and five daughters, most of whom have remained 
residents of this county. When a boy Edgar Hayden drove ox teams to 
Chicago, taking grain and hogs to the city market in that way. There were 
no railroads at that time and he did teaming to the city even after his mar- 
riage. His political \'iews have ever been in harmony with the principles of 
the Republican party, liut he has never sought or desired the honors or emolu- 
ments of public office. He has endeavored to live peaceably with all men, and 
has himself been engaged in no lawsuit. He is now a member of the town 
council of Lowell and is deeply interested in everything pertaining to its 
progress and upbuilding. 

JOSEPH HAYDEN. 

Joseph Hayden, now deceased, was a prominent old settler of Lake 
county and a man whom to know was to respect and honor. He lived here 
for many years and because of his upright life, his activity and relial:)ility in 
business and his fidelity in matters of citizenship he won the respect, con- 
fidence and friendship of the large majority of those with whom he came in 
contact. He claimed Ohio as the state of his nativity, his birth having 
occurred in Knox county, July 7, 1832. He was a son of Nehemiah Hayden, 
who removed with his family to Lake county, Indiana, during the early boy- 

32 



498 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

hood of liis son Joseph, who was reared in West Creek township upon the 
old homestead. He endured tlie hardsliips and trials incident to pioneer life 
and assisted in the arduous task of developing his father's farm. Outside of 
this no special event occurred to vary the routine of his life in his youth. 

He remained at home with his parents uj) to the time of his marriage, 
which was celebrated on the loth of October, 1854. the lady of his choice 
being Miss Maria P. Green, who was born in Michigan, March 13, 1836, 
and is a daughter of John and Phebe Green. The mother died when Mrs. 
Hayden was but a week old, and she was reared by her sister, j\Irs. Michaels. 
She was brought to Lake county when but three years old and pursued her 
education in one of the old-time log schoolhouses common in all frontier 
settlements in the middle west. By her marriage she became the mother of 
nine children : Lester, who is living in Topeka, Lidiana ; Sidney, who follows 
farming in \\'est Creek township; Williur. who carries on agricultural pur- 
suits near Alomence. Illinois: Anna, the wife of Elias Bryant, of Lafayette, 
Indiana ; Hilton, who makes his home in Chicago : Clarence, who follows 
farming near Momence, Illinois; Cass J., a banker of Grant Park, Illinois; 
Merritt, who follows farming on the old homestead; and Ralph, who is a 
phvsician of Chicago and a member of the firm of Fosmer & Hayden, dealers 
in farm lands and investments. All of the children are married. 

Joseph Havden was a life-long Republican and as a citizen was deeply 
interested in everything pertaining to public progress and improvement. He 
was honorable in all business transactions, faithful to his friends and family, 
and his death, which occurred in 1898, was therefore the occasion of deep and 
tmiform regret throughout the community in which he had so long lived. 
After her husband's demise Mrs. Hayden came to live in Lowell in 1899. 
She attends the services of the Christian church, lieing a devout member, and 
is well known in Lake county, where almost her entire life has been passed. 

GEORGE B. BAILEY. 

George B. Bailey comes from one of the old families of Lake county, 
of which he is a representative agriculturist and a man whose standing as a 
stanch business man is unquestioned. He is a native of \\'est Creek town- 
ship, of Lake county, and was born March 26. 1870, being the youngest of 
the four children, three sons and one daughter, born to Josiah and Nancy 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 499 

(Kyle) Bailey. All the children are living: Leroy is the efficient treasurer 
of Lake comity, and whose hiography appears on other pages of this volume ; 
Charles is a progressive farmer of West Creek toxAuship: Grace M. is the 
wife of F. T. Buse, also of West Creek township. 

Mr. George B. Bailey was reared and educated in Lake county. His 
advanced training was accjuired in the Valparaiso College, where he was a 
student during the years 1887-88-89 and took the teacher's course. His 
active career has been spent as an agriculturist and stiickman. and his active, 
aggressive alid business nature causes him never to stop short of real attain- 
ment in wh*ate\'er Ire undertakes. After his return from college, being the 
youngest child, he remained at home and soon l^ecame a partner with his 
father. For the past thirteen years he has been engaged in the business of 
buying and feeding cattle, being" with his father for seven years. 

No\-ember 16, 1891, he married Miss Julia Foster, and one son has been 
born to them. Leon L.. who is in the fourth grade of the public schools and 
thus early in life seems to be inclined to follow in the footsteps of his father. 
Mrs. Bailey was born in Parker. Kansas, November 16. 1872, and is the 
tenth and youngest of a family of ten children, five sons and five daughters, 
born to George Lyman and Lucy J- (Hathaway) Foster. There are nine of 
her brothers and sisters li\ing. and five are in Lake county. She was about 
four years old when the family came to Lake county. Her early education 
was obtained in the public schools, and then for two years she took the 
teacher's course in Valparaiso College. 

Mr. Bailey is a strong Republican, and was a stanch supporter of the 
administration of Benjamin Harrison, for whom he cast his first presidential 
vote, and during every subsequent administration he has upheld Republican- 
ism in doctrine and practice. He has served as a delegate to the county con- 
ventions. Mr. and ]\Irs. Bailey are peiiple who respect true Christian prin- 
ciples and the church institution, and they are attendants of the West Creek 
Methodist church. The Lowell National Bank, detailed mention of which is 
made on other pages, was organized on May 13, 1903, with a full roster of 
solid financial men at its head, and Mr. Bailey is \-ice-president of its official 
board. 

Mr. and !Mrs. Bailey's beautiful country seat, known as the "Diamond 
Farm." comprises five hundred and ninety acres, all in \\'est Creek township. 



500 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Tlieir comfortable and cosy residence was erected in 1897, and during several 
subsequent years excellent improvements and outbuildings were constructed, 
so that as concerns general appearance and profitable usefulness there is hardly 
a place in the township more deserving" of the reputation of "a model farm- 
stead." Cleanliness and order are cardinal points in the management of this 
farm, and the passer-by cannot but pause and admire the entire farm as one 
of the bright and high-class agricultural enterprises of Lake county. Mr. 
Bailey lielongs to the young and substantial business men upon whom the 
responsibility for the welfare of a community will in the main always rest. 
While enthusiastic and aggressive, he possesses also a due amount of con- 
servatism and finely balanced judgment, and these excellent qualities are to 
determine his success in the future as they have in the past and give him his 
due meed of prominence in the substantial industrial enterprise of Lake 
county. 

MRS. ELIZABETH HARRISON. 

Mrs. Elizabeth Harrison, well known in Lowell, was born in Center 
township. Lake county, Indiana, on the 17th of August. 1840. Her father. 
Dr. James A. Wood, was a native of Medina county, Ohio, and when a young 
man came to Indiana. He was married in the former state to Miss Anna 
Jacobs, whose birth occurred in New York, on the 7th of January. 1818. It 
was in the year 1838 that they removed to this state, settling in Porter county, 
and soon afterward they came to Lake county, taking up their abode in Cen- 
ter Prairie. Dr. Wood was a well-known physician and practiced for many 
years in Lake county, carrying professional assistance and relief into many 
of the households, where his labors proved of great value in the alleviation of 
human suffering. At the time of the Civil war he served as assistant surgeon 
in the First Indiana Volunteer Cavahy, and then returned to his practice in 
Lake county. He followed his profession here in the early days when the 
work of a physician demanded that he take long rides across the countr\-, for 
the homes were widely scattered. This involved many personal sacrifices and 
hardships, but Dr. ^^'ood faithfullv performed his duties as a physician and 
frequently responded to a professional call when he knew tliat he would re- 
ceive no remuneration for his services. He became very widely known 
through Lake and adjoining counties, and his professional skill, combined 
with his broad humanitarian principles and kindly spirit, won for him the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 501 

respect and love of the great majority with whom he was associated. He died 
only twenty-six days before the eighty-fourth anniversary of his birth, and 
his wife passed away in her eightieth year. They were the parents of eleven 
children, of whom two died in infancy, while three died in childhood. 

]\Irs. Harrison, the third child of this family, was reared in Lake county 
and began her education in the common schools. She afterward continued 
her studies in Crown P(nnt, Indiana, and in \'alparaiso. She afterward en- 
gaged in teaching school in Indiana. Illinois and Kansas. In 1873 she went 
to Jewell county, Kansas, where she took up a claim on which she remained 
for about two years, and during that period she continued teaching. She then 
returned to Lake count}' to take care of her parents, and remained with them 
until their death. 

On the nth of November, 1878, Miss Elizabeth Wood gave her hand 
in marriage to John Harrison, who was born in Dorchester, England, and 
died on the ist of January, 1884. Soon after her husband's death Mrs. Har- 
rison returned to Lowell, where she has since resided. With the exception 
of two years spent in the Sunflower state her entire life has been passed in 
Lake county, and she is numbered among the worthy pioneer women of this 
part of the state. She belongs to the Christian church, is a ^-ery active worker 
therein, has long been a teacher in the Sunday-school and is now a teacher of 
the old i^eople's Bible class. She is well known throughout Lake county, and 
her Christian character, her many kindly traits and good deeds have won for 
her the love and good will of those with whom she has been associated. 

JOSEPH H. COXROY. 

Joseph H. Conroy, engaged in the practice of law at Hobart, Indiana, 
was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. January 20. 1872, a son of Thomas 
and Kate (Musser) Conroy, the former a native of New York and the latter 
of .Sacramento, California. Thomas Conroy removed from the Empire state 
to Pennsylvania in early manhood, and at the time of the Civil war he re- 
sponded to the country's call for aid, enlisting in the Ninety-first Pennsyl- 
vania Infantry as a private. He served for four years, doing valiant duty 
as a defender of the Union cause. Removing westward he spent his last days 
in Allen county, Indiana, where he died in 1883. His wife was born in 
Sacramento, her parents having removed to California at an early period in 



502 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

the development of that state. She is a graduate of the Northern Indiana 
Normal School at Valparaiso, and is now a teacher in the puhlic schools of 
Hobart. 

Joseph H. Conroy, the only child born to his parents, was reared in 
Allen and in Adams counties of Indiana, having been brought to this state 
when only a year old. His education was acquired in Valparaiso, where 
he was graduated in 1890, completing the course in the scientific department 
of the Northern Indiana Normal School. In early life he had attended the 
common schools of Adams county. In August, 1890, he came to Hobart 
and was principal of the Miller puhlic school for two years, while for three 
years he engaged in teaching in the high school at Hobart. During this 
time he took up the study of law, devoting all his leisure hours to the mastery 
of the principles of jurisprudence. He read alone for a time and afterward 
under the direction of George W. Musser, an uncle, who is now a prominent 
attorney of Colorado Springs, Colorado. In 1895 he retired from the field 
of educational labor and opened a law office at Hobart, where he has since 
engaged in practice, and during the nine years which have since elapsed he 
has secured a larg-e and gratifying" clientage, connecting him with mucli im- 
portant litigation tried in the courts of this district. 

Mr. Conroy was married in 1895 to Miss Grace Rifenburg, a daughter 
of Hon. W. H. Rifenburg. There were born to Mr. and ]\Irs. Conroy three 
children, one son and two daughters: Elliott R., in the fifth grade; Kathryn 
S., who died at three years of age: Mary J., died in infancy. Mv. Conroy 
is quite prominent in fraternal circles, belonging to the Indejiendent Order of 
Odd Fellows, Earl Lodge No. 333, the Knights of Pythias fraternity No. 
458, the Knights of the Maccabees, Tent No. 65. the Modern ^Voodmen, 
Camp No. 5202, and the Independent Order of Foresters of Indiana, Court 
No. 3. He has been city attorney for five years. Since attaining his majority 
he has been recognized as a stanch advocate of the Democracy. He has 
taken a very active interest in public affairs in Hobart, and his labors and 
influence have been effective in promoting general progress and improve- 
ment He has made for himself an en\-iable reputation as a lawyer through 
earnest effort, close study and untiring devotion to his clients' interests. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 603 

F. E. NELSON. 

Few men are more prominent or more widely known in the enter- 
prising city of Lowell than F. E. Nelson, the president of the Lowell Na- 
tional Bank. His success in all his undertakings has been so marked that 
his methods are of interest to the commercial world. He has based his 
business principles and actions upon strict adherence to the rules whicli 
govern industry, economy, and strict, unswerving integrity. His enterprise 
and progressive spirit ha\-e made hini a typical American in every sense of 
the word, and he well deser\-es mention in history. What he is to-day lie 
has made himself, for he began in the world with nuthing but his own energy 
and willing hands to aid him. By constant e.xertion, associated with good 
judgment, he has raised himself to the prominent position which he now 
holds, having the friendship of many and the respect of all who know him. 

Mr. Nelson is a native son of Lake county, his birth ha\ing occurred in 
West Creek township, February 4, 1855. His father, Truman Nelson, wa.s 
born in Oswego county. New York, came to Lake county, Lidiana, in 1850, 
and after about six years' residence here was called to his final rest, his 
death occurring in 1856. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Sena 
French, was a native of Ohio and died in Lake county, Lidiana, in 1879. 
They were the parents of seven children, two daughters and five sons, of 
whom F. E. Nelson was the sixth child and fifth son. 

Reared in his native township, Mr. Nelson acquired bis' education in 
the common schools and in Valparaiso, where he studied f(5r two years. He 
also engaged in teaching, first having charge of a school when eighteen years 
of age. He continued in educational work until twenty-five years of age, 
spending two years as principal of the schools of Lowell. He was very capable 
in his work in the schoolroom, being an excellent disciplinarian and at the 
same time having the ability to impart clearly and readily to others the knowl- 
edge that he had acquired. Wlien twenty-five years of age he began farm- 
ing in the souihwestern ]jart of \Vest Creek towaiship, where he remained 
for eleven years. On the expiration of that period he removed to Lowell and 
was chosen cashier of the State Bank in 1S93, filling that position in an ac- 
ceptable manner until 1900, when the institution became the State National 
Bank of Lowell. He was retained as cashier until 1903, when he resigned 
his position, and in May of the same year joined other prominent business 



504 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

men in the organization of the Lowell National Bank, of which he was 
chosen president. He has since remained at the head of this institution, 
which is capitalized for twenty-five thousand dollars. The other officers 
are George B. Bailey, vice president, and P. A. Berg, cashier, and the directors 
are Frank E. Nelson, George B. Bailey, C. E. Nichols, George M. Death and 
Henry Suprise. In addition to his financial interests Mr. Nelson has farm- 
ing property in West Creek township. Lake county, and in Monroe county, 
Indiana. 

In 1879 ■^'^'^s celebrated the marriage of Mr. Nelson and Miss Emeline 
Foster, a daughter of Liman and Lucy Foster, early settlers of West Creek 
township, where Mrs. Nelson was born and reared. Six children graced 
this union, two sons and four daughters, namely, Raymond L., Bernice 
S., Ned E., Julia F., Emily and INIarion, all of whom are natives of Lake 
county, Indiana. 

Mr. Nelson has been a life-long Republican and for five years served as 
trustee of West Creek township. He is a member of Colfax Lodge. F. & A. 
M.. also of Lowell Lodge No. 300, K. of P., and is true and loyal to the 
teachings of these fraternities. He has been an important factor in educa- 
tional and financial circles in Lake county, and his popularity is well deserved, 
as in him are embraced the characteristics of an unbending integrity, unabat- 
ing energ)^ and industry that never flags. 

DANIEL LYNCH. 

Daniel Lynch is an honored veteran of the Civil war and is now filling 
the position of postmaster at Lowell. He was born in Cedar Creek town- 
ship. Lake count}', Indiana, on the 6tli of July, 1843, and is a son of Daniel 
and Mary Lynch, both of whom were natives of Ireland and became resi- 
dents of Lake county during the pioneer epoch in its history. The father was 
identified with the early progress and development of this portion of the state. 
He died in the month of February, 1843. and it was not until July following 
that the birth of the son Daniel occurred. The mother afterward married 
again, and Daniel Lynch, remained at home -with his step-father until aliout 
fourteen years of age and during that period attended the common schools 
through the winter months. He afterward started out in life on his own 
account and worked by the month as a farm hand, thus earning his living 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 505 

until after the outbreak of the Civil war. He watched with interest the 
progress of events in the south, and in 1861 he enlisted as a member of 
Company H, Ninth Indiana Volunteer Infantry, of which he became a pri- 
vate. He served in this regiment for about a year and a half. He was 
wounded at the battle of Shiloh. after which he received an honorable dis- 
charge on account of his disability. Later, wlien he had recovered his health, 
he once more offered his services to the government and this time became a 
member of Company A, One Hundred and Fifty-sixth Illinois Infantry, with 
which he served until the close of the war. He was promoted from the ranks 
to the position of orderly serg^eant and was then discharged. He participated 
in a number of important engagements, and was always a loyal defender of 
the L^nion cause, faithfully performing his duty, whether it led him into the 
thickest of the fight or stationed him on the lonely picket line. 

When the war was over and the preservation of the L'nion was assured 
Daniel Lynch located in Hebron, Porter county, Indiana, where he was en- 
gaged in the livery business for two years. On the expiration of that period 
he removed to Lowell, where he conducted a similar business for about twelve 
years, when he traded his liverv' stable for a farm in Center township. There 
he carried on agricultural pursuits for seven years, at the end of which time 
he sold his property and bought a farm in Cedar Creek tow-nship, one mile 
from Lowell. This he continued to cultivate and improve for about twelve 
years, when he again sold out and once more took up his abode in Lowell. He 
was appointed postmaster under President McKinley in 1897 and was re- 
appointed in 1902 by President Roosevelt, so that he is now filling the posi- 
tion. As a public official he is capable and loyal, his administration being 
characterized by business-like manner, and the patrons of the office have for 
him high words of commendation. In politics he has ever been a stanch 
Republican, having firm faith in the principles of the party. 

In 1S69 was- celebrated the marriage of Mr. Lynch and ^liss Ada Starr, 
and to them have been born five children: Fred J.. Alva, Daniel, Benjamin 
L. and Ruby. Mr. Lynch is a member of Burnham Post No. 256. at Lowell, 
in which he has filled some of the offices. He is likewise a member of Colfax 
Lodge No. 356, F. & A. M. Mr. Lynch is a self-made man, who without 
extraordinary family or pecuniary advantages at the commencement of life 
has labored earnestly and energetically and by indomitable courage and in- 



506 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tegrity has achieved both character and a fair measure of success By sheer 
force of will and untiring effort he has worked his way upward and is num- 
bered among the respected and leading citizens of Lowell. 

H. F. C. jMILLER. ^^r. D. 

Dr. Miller, who recently passed away, was a native of New York city, 
born on the 15th of September, 1850. His father, Augustus Miller, was 
born in Westchester county, New York, and was a son of Daniel Miller, 
whose birth occurred in the eastern part of this country. The family is of 
German lineage and was established in America in colonial days. Augustus 
Miller was reared in the county of his nativity. He was reared by a carriage 
manufacturer of Bedford and he spent his entire life in Westchester county, 
residing upon a farm until called to his final rest at the age of sixty-four 
years. He married Miss Emily Baker, a native of Connecticut, or of New- 
York. She is still living in the Empire state at the advanced age of eighty- 
five years, and she is of Scotch descent. Bv her marriage she became the 
mother of seven children, all of whom have passed away with the exception 
of one daughter and Horace B. Miller, of New York, 

Dr. ;\Iiller, the fourth child of the family, was reared in New York, while 
his education was accpiired in the jniblic schools and in the academy at Bed- 
ford, that state. At the age of sixteen years he started out to make his own 
way in the world and secured a clerkship in the wholesale and retail jewelry 
store of Brown, Spalding & Company, of New York city. There he remained 
for about four years and was afterward for two years with the firm of Sco- 
ville. Gray & Company, also jewelry merchants of that city. Desiring, 
however, to leave mercantile circles and enter professional life, he took up 
the study of medicine, and from 1872 until 1877 was a student in Rush 
Medical College of Chicago, being graduated in the latter year. ]Most of 
the money needed to pay his college expenses was earned by him. and he 
certainlv deserved great credit for thus acquiring his education as well as for 
the success which he gained since his graduation. 

Dr. Miller located for practice at Salem Crossing in LaPorte county, 
Lidiana, where be remained for about two years, and then came to Hobart 
in 1879. Here he was in active practice until 1890, when he removed to 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 507 

Chicago, where he remained for five years, but in 1895 returned to Hobart. 
He enjoyed a large and growing patronage. 

In July, 1874, Dr. Miller was united in marriage to Miss Deetta Van 
Horn, who was born in Herkimer county. New York, and in childhood came 
to Indiana, where she was reared and educated. It was in 1857 that her 
parents, Jake and Elizabeth (Brown) Van Horn, came to this state. Mr. 
and Mrs. Miller had two sons and twn daughters. Spencer A. ; Jennie D., 
who is the wife of Ed Tibbits, of Urbana, Illinois ; Hosea Mortimer ; and 
Julia E., at home. They also lost one daughter. Emily E. 

Dr. Miller was an exemplary member of the Masonic fraternity and at 
one time took a very active part in other fraternal organizations, but the 
demands of his practice left him little time for such work. He was a Demo- 
crat in his political views. He had a large patronage, which extended to 
Valparaiso, South Chicago and even to the city of Chicago. The resolution 
which he showed in acquiring an education was proof of the elemental 
strength of his character, and. his latent resources and powers were developed 
as the years passed until he stood as one of the strongest representatives 
of !i;s profession. 

JOHN A. KIMMET. 

One of the most prominent and energetic Inisiness men of Lowell and 
Lake county is John A. Kinimet, the \ice president of the State National 
Bank at Ldwell, a director of the First National Bank at Dyer, and a dealer 
in grain, lumber and building materials. His business career has been char- 
acterized by consecutive advancement along modern lines of progress, and 
his ready recognition and utilization of opportunity have formed the basis 
of his present success. His activity touches so many lines of business that 
he has become a most important factor in commercial and financial circles, 
and while promoting his individual success he has at the same time contrib- 
uted to the general prosperity. He is a self-made man. and one who deserves 
great credit for what he has accomplished, since he started out in life empty- 
handed, but, brooking no obstacles that could be overcome by determined 
purpose and honorable effort, has steadily worked his way upward. 

Mr. Kimmet was lx)rn in a log stable in Seneca county, Ohio, on the 
25th of April, 1856. His father, Jacob Kimmet, was born in Bavaria, 
Germany, near the river Rhine. After establishing his home in Seneca 



508 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

county. Ohio, he became prominent and inflnential there, and although he was 
in very hmited financial circumstances during the period of his early residence 
in that portion of the Buckeye state, he improved his opportunities and 
through earnest labor won a comfortable competence. His ability and loy- 
alty to the general good made him a recognized leader in public affairs, and 
one who aided in shaping public thought and action. In political circles 
he was particularly influential, and he delivered campaign addresses through- 
out the state in connection with Charles Foster. He also held local positions 
in Seneca county. His wife bore the maiden name of Catherine Scheiber, 
and was born in France. She came to America when six years of age, and 
was reared among the Indians v/ho lived in Seneca county, Ohio. Mr. and 
Mrs. Scheiber, the maternal grandparents of Mr. Kimmet, lived for the 
first six months of their residence in this countrv in a house liuilt with only 
four posts, and later used to shelter cattle. "Sirs. Catherine Kimmet 
made all the clothes for her children from raw wool, which she spun and 
wove, and from the cloth she manufactured coats, pants and even hats and 
caps. Like her hu.sband. she bravely met the conditions of pioneer life, but 
as the years advanced all the comforts of civilization were introduced and 
the family were enabled to enjoy better privileges and come into possession 
of many of the luxuries of life. Mr. John A. Kimmet has eight living 
brothers, all of whom voted for William McKinley as the presidential can- 
didate of the Republican party. Seven of the number are residents of Ohio, 
and one, George Kimmet, is now a merchant of Lowell, Indiana. The only 
sister. Tillie, is the wife of Anthony Deponet, of Seneca county, Ohio, 

John A. Kimmet was but seven years of age when his father removed 
from the log stable in which the son had been born into a house built after 
more modern plans. His early education was acquired in the com.mon 
schools, but afterwards he enjoyed excellent school privileges, attending 
Heidelberg College at Tiffin, Ohio: St. Vincent College in Westmoreland 
county, Pennsylvania : and St, Francis College near Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 
It was his intention to prepare for the ministry of the Catholic church, and 
he studied Latin, English and German, devoting five years to the mastery of 
the first named language. When but sixteen years of age he began teaching, 
and followed that profession for five years in Ohio, He was also principal 
of the Dyer school in Lake county, Indiana, for three years. In the mean- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 509 

time he abandoned his intention of becoming a member of the priesthood, 
and on the loth of July, i8Si. he removed to Lowell, where he has since 
been an active business man. He assisted in building the elevator here, and 
is now well known as a grain merchant at this place. He was the business 
manager for the Du Breuil and Keilman firm from 1881 to 1892. When 
the senior partner of that firm died ]\[r. Kimmet purchased a half interest 
in the firm, which is now conducted under the firm style of L. Keilman & 
Company, the partners being L. Keilman and John A. Kimmet. Mr. Kim- 
met also owns a farm of twenty acres, on which he resides and which is 
located within the city limits of Lowell. 

In 1893 '"'^ became a director of the State Bank of Lowell, and later, 
upon the consolidation of the State Bank with the First National Bank, 
the name of State National Bank was chosen. Upon the death of A. A. 
Gerish, vice president, Mr. Kimmet was appointed vice president, and holds 
said position now. He is also a director of the First National Bank at Dyer, 
is engaged in the milling business, and is dealing in grain, lumber and 
building materials. His business interests have assumed extensive and profit- 
able proportions, and his activity has reached out to many lines of trade 
that affect general progress. 

On the 24th of June, 1880, occurred the marriage of Mr. Kimmet and 
Miss Maggie Keilman, a daughter of Leonard and Magdalena (Austgen) 
Keilman. Mrs. Kimmet was born and reared at Dyer, and by her marriage 
has become the mother of eleven children, seven of whom are yet living : 
M. Tillie. M. Lena. Rose, Charles F., Ida V., Celia M. and Hilda. Those 
who have passed away are Elizabeth, Rose, Leonard, and one that died in 
infancy. 

Mr. Kimmet is a gold Democrat, and cast his ballot for William Mc- 
Kinley in order that he might support the gold standard, the money question 
being at that time the paramount issue before the people. He is a member 
of the Catholic church, and was active in the building of the house of wor- 
ship at Lowell in 1897, contributing more largely to this undertaking than 
any other resident of the community. In public affairs he is very prominent, 
and his aid and co-operation might l^e counted upon for all measures that 
have for their object the public welfare and general advancement. He is 
now treasurer of the Three Creek Monument Association, a monument 



510 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

being erected at Lowell in memory of the soldiers of the three townships of 
West Creek, Eagle Creek and Cedar Creek. He is also a trustee of the high 
school at Lowell. He possesses untiring energy, is quick of perception, 
forms his plans readily and is determined in their execution. His close 
application to business and his excellent management have brought to him 
the high degree of prosperity which is to-day his, but while he has gained 
wealth it has not been alone the goal for which he is striving, for he belongs 
to that class of representative American citizens who promote the general 
prosperity while advancing individual interests. 

NICKOLAS SCHAFER. 

Nickolas Schafer, of West Creek township, is a leading and prosperous 
farmer of this section of Lake county. He is of German birth and parentage, 
although he has spent all the years of his life since early boyhood in this 
country. It is to the lasting credit of the sterling ability and wortli of the 
German- American citizens that such l.ieautiful agricultural sections as that 
comprised in West Creek township have been largely developed and brought 
to their present value and richness through the painstaking efforts and 
intelligent direction of men of this nationality, among whom Mr. Schafer 
is one of the most influential and progressive. 

His birthplace was along the lieautiful and historic Rhine river, at the 
village of Alflen, in Prussia, where he first saw the light of day on January 
12. 1846. He was the second in age of a family of ten children, six sons 
and four daughters, and he and his brother Edward are the only survivors, 
the latter being a resident of Chicago and an engineer on a lake steamer. 
His parents were Jacob and Anna Mary (Schoenerock) Schafer. His father 
was born in the same part of Germany, June 13, 1817, and died July 2^, 
1880. He was educated in Germany and reared to agricultural pursuits, 
and about 1855 embarked his family and sailed down the Rhine to the North 
sea, thence to London, where he set out for the new world in a sailing vessel 
which was seven weeks before reaching the port of New York. Storms 
and heavy seas beset the ship, and the passengers were compelled to cook 
their own meals and endure many other hardships before blessed land finally 
hove in sight, many times it seeming as if the craft would go to the bottom. 
From New York city the family went to Springfield Hollow, in New York, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 511 

and remainetl there a year and a half, and thence made tlie once more stormy 
and perilous voyage by the great lakes to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. This 
German family landed in the new world with only two dollars in cash, and 
a friend afforded them free transportation to the village of Springfield Hol- 
low. From this state of povert}' of material resources, when they were in a 
strange country and unahle to speak the English tongue, handicapped in 
countless ways, their honest industry and persevering labors effected, in the 
end, a substantial and honorable place in the world's activity. The father 
Jacob got work in the erection of the custom house at Milwaukee, at a dollar 
and twelve cents a day, and was thus employed for three years. He then 
m.oved to Dodge county, Wisconsin, near Beaver Dam, and purchased forty 
acres of land and engaged in farming and stock-raising. He finally sold 
this and came to Ch.icago, where he was in the lumber yards for a year, and 
then arrived in West Creek township of Lake county. Here he purchased 
one hundred acres of land, going in debt nine hundred dollars for it, and by 
industry and good management paid off the entire indebtedness and resided 
on this good home until his death. He was entirely independent in political 
sentiments, and he and his wife were Catholics and members of the St. 
Martin's church at Hano\'er Center. His wife was also born near the river 
Rhine, August i, 1821, and she died December 13, 1898. She was a kind 
and good mother, and a good disciplinarian in her home. 

Mr. Schafer was nine years old when the eventful journey was made 
to this country, and he was educated mainly in the English tongue, although 
he can read the German te.xt. His life has been throughout devoted to farm- 
ing pursuits, and he was no more than twelve years old when he began adding 
his share of labor to the family establishment, and he remained with his 
parents until he was grown to manhood. .\t the age of twelve he began 
working for wages, four dollars and a cjuarter per month, and the first cow 
and the first pair of steers owned by the family were purchased from his 
wages. With the exception of one year in Chicago he has spent all his active 
life on the farm. 

October 9, 1883, he was married to Miss Mary Massoth, and it is to 
their combined industry and management that their success has been mainly 
due. They have been the parents of nine children, and happily the family 
circle has never been broken bv the hand of death. The children are as fol- 



512 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

lows: John Adam, who is in the eighth grade and already a practical farmer; 
Henry, who is in the seventh grade; Cecelia M., who has passed the eighth 
grade; Katrina, in the seventh grade; and Ida E., John J., Marie, Mar- 
guerite and Frank Nicholas. The first three children have been confirmed, 
the two sons by Bishop Radamacher, and Cecelia by Bishop Allerding, of 
the North Bishopric of Indiana. 

Mrs. Schafer was born in Hanover township, Lake county, May 5, 
1863, and is the second and the only survivor of the three children, all daugh- 
ters, born to Adam and Johanna (Hack) Massoth. Her father was born in 
Hesse-Darmstadt, Germany, September 8, 1833, and died September 2, 1899. 
He came to America when a young man, and with his mother purchased 
forty acres of land just north of pretty Cedar Lake in Lake county. He 
was a Democrat in politics, and he and his wife Catholics. Mrs. Schafer's 
mother was a native of St. John township in this county, and was the first 
white child born in the township. She was educated in the German lan- 
guage. Mrs. Schafer was born and reared in this county, and was con- 
firmed at the age of thirteen by Bishop Twenger of St. Martin's. 

After their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Schafer began life on the farm 
where they still reside. Their first estate consisted of one hundred and 
twenty-nine acres, and most of the improvements have been placed there 
by their own efforts. Their home is a large and comfortable country resi- 
dence, and their farm, now comprising twd hundred and forty-four acres 
in Center, Hanover and West Creek townships, is among the best land in 
the county. And they have especial reason to be proud that there is not a 
dollar against the entire estate. 

Mr. Schafer is, like his father, entirely independent as to politics, and 
casts his vote according to his best judgment and where he thinks it will do 
the most good. He and his wife are members of St. Martin's church, and 
Mrs. Schafer is a member of the Rosary sodality and Cecelia a member of 
the young ladies' sodality. 

CHARLEY T. BAILEY. 

Industry and enterprise coupled with a disposition of sagacity culminate 
in the sucessful man of the day. The truth of this aphorism is especially 
manifest in the case of Charley T. Bailey, who comes from one of the most 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 513 

prominent families in the west part of Lake county. He is a native of Illi- 
nois, was born in Kankakee county, April 12, 1862, being the second of a 
family of four children, three sons and one daughter, the oldest of whom is 
Levi E., the county treasurer of Lake county, who is represented elsewhere 
in this volume; the daughter Grace is the wife of Fred T. Buse, a prosperous 
agi-iculturist of W'est Creek township (see their sketch) ; and George, an- 
other leading farmer of West Creek township. The father of this family 
is biographed in full on another page, and mother Bailey is deceased. 

Mr. Charley T. Bailey was an infant when he became a resident of 
Lake county, and consecjuently he has been reared in this county. He is a 
practical agriculturist and stock farmer, and in the latter department of his 
business has gained more than ordinary reputation. He makes a specialty 
of Hereford cattle and coach horses. He has one of the finest Hereford 
bulls to be found in northern Indiana, having purchased it from the well 
known stockman, Tom Clarke, of Beecher, Illinois. He is making a great 
success in the breeding of this fine stock, and his long experience of sixteen 
years has given him a big leverage for causing a happy culmination of all 
his enterprises. He has devoted much time and money to raising the grade 
of cattle to a high standard in this county. He has also bred coach horses 
for a number of years. 

j\Ir. Bailey is what may be termed a self-made man, having in a scholas- 
tic sense received only a common school education and one term in high 
school. He remained at home till the age of twenty-six, when he married 
for his first wife ^liss Tillie E. Grimes, on April 23, 1888. Four children, 
two sons and two daughters, were born of this union, and all are living. 
The eldest is Alay, who graduated from the eighth grade as salutatorian of 
her class and has also taken instrumental music : Ray is in the seventh grade 
of school : and Earl and Hilda are both at the sixth grade in their school 
work. All the children are bright and progressing rapidly in their prepara- 
tion for life's larger duties. Mrs. Bailey, the mother of this family, died on 
January 3, 1897. On September 4. 1899, Mr. Bailey was united in marriage 
to Aliss Esther Starkweather, who was born in Michigan and was reared 
and educated in that state, graduating from the Romeo schools. She is a 
woman of more than ordinary business ability and acumen, and has been able 

to assist her husband in many ways. 
33 



514 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

After his first marriage \Iy. Bailey located on one hundred and forty- 
acres in section 7 of ^^'est Creek township, and he has made his home here 
ever since, although his first tract of land was but the nucleus of his present 
fine large estate. He has erected a modern country residence and excellent 
barns and outbuildings, and now owns four hundrd and fifty-three acres of 
land in this township. His farm is known as the Lanthus stock farm, which 
name was given by the government when it established the postoffice which 
at one time existed on this farm. Mr. Bailey is classed among the young 
and successful and progressi\'e farmers of this township, and coming from 
such a prominent family as the Baileys are in Lake county it is a pleasure to 
be able to record his biography in this handsome work. 

Mr. Bailey is a stanch Republican, and cast his first presidential vote 
for James G. Blaine, the "plumed knight." He has ever since strenuously 
upheld the banner of Republicanism during each administration. He has 
been chosen as a delegate to the county and district conventions, but as to 
ofiice-seeking has never had any aspirations at all. Mr. and Mrs. Bailey at- 
tend the West Creek Methodist Episcopal church, and contriluite their share 
of the benevolences. Their beautiful estate lies entirely in West Creek town- 
ship, and they stand high in the estimation of all who know them. ^Ir. 
Eailey has traveled cpiite extensively in the jNIississippi valley and also in the 
east, and is a well informed man both as to his business and concerning the 
outside world and its important happenings. 

LEWIS G. LITTLE. 

Among the many names known for integrity of character and honesty 
of purpose in West Creek township of Lake county we find that of Little 
to hold no inconspicuous place, and it is with modest courtesy that we present 
a review of Mr. Lewis G. Little, a scion of this well known family. He is 
a product of this locality of Lake county and was born February 21, 1861, 
being the eldest of the seven children, three sons and four daughters, born 
to Joseph .\. and ]\Iary (Gerrish) Little. Six of the children are still liv- 
ing, and in order of birth from Lewis they are: James H., \\ho is a pros- 
perous agriculturist and stockman of West Creek township, and whose per- 
sonal sketch will be found in this work; Ellen, who is now the wife of the 
Rev. John C. Wilson, minister of the Presbyterian church at Willow City, 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 615 

North Dakota, b}- whom she has three children, was formerly a successful 
teacher in the schools of Lake county, and was educated at the Oxford Fe- 
male Seminary at Oxford, Ohio ; Jesse, a prosperous farmer of West Creek 
township, resides on the old homestead with his mother, and his history 
will also be found elsewhere in this volume; Myra is the wife of Solomon 
Spry, of West Creek township; J\L Emma, wife of Claire Landis, a resident 
of Montreal, Canada, and a mechanical draftsman for the Northern Pacific 
Railroad, lias one son, Chester G. by name. 

The father of this family was born in the Granite state of New FTamp- 
shire in 1830, and died February ig. 1892. By occupation he was a farmer. 
He was reared in his nati\'e state, and about 1856 he migrated to Lake 
county. Indiana, where he purchased some two hundred and forty acres of 
land in West Creek township. He traced his lineage to the English, and 
some of his ancestors figured as soldiers in the Revolutionary war. There 
was a Benjamin Little who bore arms against the British and who himself 
weighed by ninety-six pounds and carried an old flint-lock or Queen Ann's 
gun that itself weighed twelve pounds. The Little family are of most hon- 
orable birth and lineage. Joseph A. Little, the father, was an old-line Whig 
in politics, Init at the birth of the Republican ])arty he ardently espoused its 
political and moral principles, and continued so until his death. He repre- 
sented his district most worthily in the Indiana state legislature in 1886 and 
1S87. While residents of the east he and his good wife were members of the 
Congregational church, but in West Creek township they became members 
and devoted adherents of the Lake Prairie Presljyterian church. His wife 
was also a native of Nev.' Hampshire, and is still living. 

Mr. Lewis G. Little was reared in his native county, and after finishing 
the common schools he took a course of study at \Vabash College in Craw- 
fordsville. He is a gentleman of modest and unassuming disposition, avoid- 
ing aught that savors of display or ostentation. June 12, 1900, he was 
married to Miss Efiie G. Kearney, who was born in Will county, Illinois. 
She followed the profession of teacher before her marriage. Politically 
Mr. Little is a Republican, and began his active advocacy of the principles of 
that party by casting his first presidential vote for James G. Blaine, the 
Plumed Knight. He anrl his wife are member of the Lake Prairie Presby- 
terian church. He and his wife enjoy the comforts of a happy and cosy 



510 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

farm residence, where they meet and welcome their many friends from the 
community. 

JACOB HAYDEN. 

Jacob Hayden, a retired farmer and one of the early settlers of Lake 
county now living in Lowell, was born in Knox county. Ohio, March ii, 
1 83 1. His parents were Nehemiah and Harriet (Kitchell) Hayden, both of 
whom were natives of New Jersey and became pioneer settlers of Knox 
county, Ohio, where they were married. Li March, 1837, they removed to 
Lake county. Indiana, casting in their lot with its pioneer residents. They 
settled in West Creek township, where Nehemiah Hayden developed 
a new farm, continuing the work of improvement and culti^•ation there 
until his death, which occurred when he was but fifty-eight years of age. 
His wife died at the age of forty-two years. In their family were thirteen 
children, of whom Jacob Hayden was the sixth in order of birth, and he was 
but six years of age at the time of the removal to Lake county. 

In a log schoolhouse near his father's home Jacob Hayden pursued 
his education. His training at farm labor was not as meager as his school 
privileges, for at an early age he began to assist in the cultivation and de- 
velopment of the home farm and continued to follow- agricultural pursuits 
for many years. He was married December 10, 1854, to Miss Sarah M. 
Knisely, a daughter of Edwin and Barbara (Baughman) Knisely, both of 
whom were natives of Tuscarawas county, Ohio, where they were reared and 
married. They came to Lake county in 1837, and the father, who was born 
in 18 1 4, passed away in 1886 when about seventy-two years of age. The 
mother, who was born in October, 1819, is still living, having reached the very 
venerable age of eighty-five years. In their family were eleven children, 
of wdiom Mrs. Hayden is the eldest, and she was a maiden of fourteen 
summers when she came to Lake county. Her birth occurred in Tuscarawas 
county. Ohio, August 7. 1837. 

At the time of their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Hayden began their domes- 
tic life in West Creek township, where he was engaged in farming, and 
there they lived for more than forty-four years. He devoted his energies 
to the improvement and cultivation of his fields and annually gathered rich 
harvests as a reward for his labors. He now owns one hundred and sixty 
acres of land, hut at one time the old family homestead comprised more 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 517 

than four Inmdred acres, but lie has I)een very generous with his children, 
dividing" his landed possessions with them. He was in very limited circum- 
stances when he started out in life on his own account, possessing only 
two steers. In the early days he hauled wheat to Chicago with an ox team, 
and sold the grain for thirty-five cents per bushel. He went through all the 
hardships and experiences of pioneer life, and carried on farming at a time 
when much of the work was done by hand, before the introduction of the 
modern machinery' which is to-day in use and has rendered labor much less 
difficult than it was in former years. He is now living retired in the enjoy- 
ment of a well earned rest, his capital having been acquired entirely through 
his own labors. 

To Mr. and Mrs. Hayden have been born nine children : Elmer, Lerov, 
Alice, Fred, Bertha, Martha, George, Jessie and Grace. George and Grace 
are now deceased, and the others are all married. One son now lives in 
Bloomington, Indiana, one daughter in Billings, Montana, while |he others 
are residents of West Creek township. Lake county, and with the exception 
of the eldest son, who was born in Illinois, all are natives of Lake county, 
Indiana. Mr. Hayden has given his political allegiance to the Republican 
party since its organization, and prior to that time he was a Whig. He 
voted for Fremont in 1856 and for Lincoln in i860 and 1864, and since 
that time he has supported each presidential candidate of the party. At one 
time he served as assessor of \^^est Creek township, but has never sought or 
desired political preferment. On the contrary, he has felt that his business 
affairs claimed his entire time and attention, and in the careful conduct of 
his agricultural interests he has won the prosperity that now enables him to 
live a retired life. 

ELDON N. HAYHURST. 

Eldon N. Hayhurst is representati\-e of the best interests of western 
Lake county, whether in industrial, social, intellectual or moral affairs. Em- 
erson has said that the true history of a nation is best told in the lives of its 
progressive citizens, and in presenting the biographies of the foremost men 
of this county there is necessarily and at the same time a recording of the 
most authentic annals of Lake county's history. 

Mr. Hayhurst was born May 16, 1867, in Momence township, Kankakee 
county, Illinois, being the fourth in a family of six chililren, four sons and 



51S HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

two daughters, born to Benjamin Perry and Juliet ( Farrington ) Ha}iuu"st. 
There are four of his brotiiers and sisters still living: Isadora is the wife of 
Hubert C. Libheart, of Woodstock, Illinois; Alvin is a barber of Chicago; 
Ellsworth is a barber in Kankakee, Illinois, and is married : Alletha is the 
wife of John Hart, a carriage-maker of Connersville, Indiana. 

Mr. Hayhurst's father was born in Yellowhead township. Kankakee 
county, Illinois, in December, 1838, and died in March, 1883, being of Eng- 
lish lineage. He was reared to farm pursuits and was educated in the public 
schools. He enlisted as a Union soldier in Company K, Seventy-sixth Illi- 
nois Infantry, and was at the siege of Vicksburg and with Sherman on the 
march to the sea. He served as a boy in blue for two years, and then 
received an honorable discharge. He was a Republican in politics. His 
wife survives him and is a resident of Attica, Indiana, being sixty years of 
age. 

Mr. Eldon N. Hayhurst lived the first seventeen years of his life in Illi- 
nois, and received his education in the common schools. He has depended on 
his own energy and resources for success in life, and is truly a self-made man. 
At the age of sixteen he hired out for a wage of sixteen dollars a month, and 
when he began life on his own account at the age of majority he had a small 
capital. 

On December 22. 1886, he was married to Miss Lizzie Hayden. and 
five children have been born to them, all but one living at the present time. 
Lyrrel, the eldest, received her diploma from the schools in 1902, and has 
also taken a year of high school work, being especially fond of the sciences; 
she has taken about five years of piano instruction and is a lover of music 
and accomplished in the art beyond the average of young ladies. Kitchell, 
who is in the eighth grade of school, has also taken some music instruction. 
Eleanor is in the third grade, and the youngest of the family is Ruby. Mrs. 
Hayhurst was born December 30, 1866. in Kankakee county, and is a daugh- 
ter of John and Rachel (Dodge) Hayden. whose histories are told on other 
pages of this volume. The Hayden family is one of the oldest and most 
progressive in Lake county, and its \arious members have taken a prominent 
part in developing its resources. The lineage of the family is English. Mrs. 
Havhurst was reared in her native county until her marriage. 

Mr. and ]\Irs. Hayhurst began domestic life as tenant farmers on eighty 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 519 

acres of land in \\'est Creek township, and continued as renters until 1896. 
They tlien purchased one liundred and thirty-three acres of good land with 
modern improvements, and as they were continually prospered in their en- 
deavors, in igoi they hought eighty acres just east of their original estate. 
On April 7, 1904, they purchased one hundred and sixty acres in Hand county, 
Soutli Dakota, near Wessington, and they now ha\'e fine property holdings 
and are in comfortable circumstances as a re\\ard of past industry and effect- 
ive management. Air. Hayhurst takes much pride in his Percheron horses, 
and raises only good grades of live-stock. He is a Republican in politics, and 
his active participation in public affairs as a voter began with the campaign 
of Benjamin Harrison. He has served as a delegate to the county con- 
ventions at various times. Fraternallv he affiliates with Lodge No. 300 of 
the Knights of Pythias at Lowell, and the choice of himself and wife as to 
churches has favored the Christian den(imination. 

ALBERT L. HAYDEN. 

The student of history does not have to carrv his investigations far into 
the annals of this section of the country without learning of the important 
part which the Hay den family have played in the agricultural development 
and progress of western Lidiana and eastern Illinois. Air. Hayden of this 
review was for many years closely identified with agricultural interests, and 
is now enjoying a well earned rest in Lowell. He was Irorn in Kankakee 
county, Illinois, about seven rods from the boundary line of Lake county, 
Lidiana, on the ist of March, 1849. His father, Daniel Hayden, was a native 
of Knox county, Ohio, and was the eldest S(in in a family of thirteen children. 
He came to Lake count}' in 1837, locating in West Creek township near the 
state boundary line. Soon afterward, however, he crossed the boundary 
line into Kankakee county, Illinois. Ijut he ever maintained his association 
with the public interests and with the -people of Lake county. His death 
occurred w hen he was sixty-nine years of age. In early manhood he married 
Louisa Hill, a native of Connecticut and who lived to be sixty-five years of 
age. They were the parents of thirteen children, all of whom reached adult 
age and are still lix'ing. All are married and most of the number reside in 
Lake county. 

Albert L. Havden, the second child and eldest son, was but twelve years 



520 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

of age when his father luiilt a home in \Vest Creek township. Lake county, 
just across the horcler Hne from Illinois. He was reared in that township 
and began his education in a log schoolhouse, where he mastered the elemen- 
tary branches of English learning. He attended school only through the 
winter months, while in the summer seasons his time and energies were de- 
voted to farm work. He remained at home until he had attained his ma- 
jority, assisting in the development of his father's farm and thus gaining 
the practical knowledge and experience which enaliled him to successfully 
carry on agricultural pursuits in later years. 

On the 26th of January, 1872, Mr. Hayden was united in marriage to 
Miss Julia Clement, a daughter of H, V. and L}'dia (DeA\'itt) Clement, 
who became pioneer residents of Lake county and were here married. ]\Irs. 
Hayden was born in Fulton county, Ohio, and was only about a year old 
when brought to Lake county, her girlhood days being passed in Cedar 
Creek township. She attended the common schools and was also trained 
in the work of the household so that she was well qualified to take up the 
cares of her own home at the time of her marriage. By this union have 
been born three children : Amenzo, who is a resident farmer of Lake county ; 
Albert D., who follows agricultural pursuits in West Creek township; and 
Lydia, at home. 

At the time of his marriage Albert L. Hayden located on a farm in 
West Creek township, where he remained for three years, at the end of 
which time he removed to Cass county, Iowa, where he spent about seven 
years. He then again took up his abode in ^^^est Creek township, where he 
carried on general farming until 1902, since which time he has lived retired. 
He owns, however, a farm of one hundred and sixt}' acres, which is well 
improved and is equipped with all modern conveniences. The improvements 
upon this property he made himself, and the farm is, therefore, a monument 
to his capable management, unflagging energy and business capacity. No 
one need remain in doubt as to his political \iews. for he is fearless and out- 
spoken in his advocacy of the princijilcs of the Republican party, believing 
that its platform contains the best elements of good government. He is now 
enjoying a well earned rest at his pleasant home in Lowell, ha\-ing won the 
competence that enables him to li\e retired. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 521 

\\TLLL\M BUCKLEY. 

William Buckle}', who was formerly ideiitifietl with agricultural inter- 
ests in Lake county, but has put aside business cares and is now resting in 
the enjoyment of the fruits of his former toil at his pleasant home in Lowell, 
is numbered among the worthy citizens that Ireland has furnished to Indiana. 
He was born in county Cork, Ireland, in 1831. His father, Dennis Buckley, 
was also a native of that count}', and in the green isle of Erin carried on 
agricultural pursuits, making his home there until 1849. when he came to 
Lake county, Indiana. He settled in Cedar Creek township, about a half 
mile from the present site of Lowell, but he was not long permitted to enjoy 
his new home, his death occurring in 1851. His wife, who bore the maiden 
name of Catherine Fleming, was born in county Cork, Ireland, and died 
in Lake county, Indiana, in 1858. Their family numbered five children, four 
sons and a daughter, and William Buckley is the eldest. John is a resident 
of Lowell ; and Patrick makes his home in Cedar Creek township, where 
he follows agricultural pursuits. The sister, Julia, is the wife of Patrick 
Feley, a leading farmer of Cedar Creek township. She is the only sister of 
Mr. Buckley. 

The first eighteen years of his life William Buckley passed in Ireland, 
and then came to America, hoping that he might have better business oppor- 
tunities in the new world. He made his way direct to Lake county, where 
he began working by the month as a farm hand, and following any employ- 
ment that would yield him an honest living. He assisted in building the 
first brick house in Lowell and for some time worked for Mr. Halsted, the 
founder of the town. He was employed by the month for about five years, 
and then began buying small tracts of land. He soon located on one of 
these and improved the place. In partnership with his brothers, John and 
Patrick, he carried on agricultural pursuits for several years. He after- 
ward engaged in farming alone until about seven years ago, when he retired 
from active connection with agricultural pursuits and took up his abode in 
Lowell. His progress has been consecutive and enviable. He has worked 
on year after year, and as his financial resources have increased he has 
become the owner of valuable realty holdings. To-day he owns four hundred 
acres of good farming land in Lake county, all of which has been accumulated 
through his capable management. 



n22 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Buckley has been twice married. He first wedded ]\Iiss Elizabetli 
Darst. who died leaving nine children, namely : Kate, Franklin D., Dennis 
P., Addie. Julia ]\I., John P., Joseph L.. Fred W. and Raymond. John P. 
is a finely educated man. He graduated at Valparaiso College, .and is a 
professor of chemistry in a college in Chicago. He received his education 
by his own ambition. On the 3d ot June, 1901, Air. Buckley was again 
married, his second union being with a Airs. Louisa Comeford. who was born 
in Vermilion county. Illinois, June 11, 1851. but was reared in Dwight, Illi- 
nois. She is a daughter of Reuten and Lovina (Kuntz) Comeford, both 
of whom are now deceased. Airs. Buckley is the mother of nine children 
by a former marriage: John F., Fred \\'., Alary A., Thomas P., Daniel A., 
Joseph E.. Rosa E., Ella L. and Lizzie L. Comeford. 

Air. Buckley is a member of the Catholic cluirch and in politics is a 
Democrat, where state and national issues are involved, but at local elections 
he votes independently. He has never had occasion to regret his determina- 
tion to seek a home in the new world. He found the opportunities he sought, 
— which, by the way, are always open t(3 the ambitious, energetic man, — 
and, making the best of these, he has steadily worked his way upward. He 
possessed the resolution, perseverance and reliability so characteristic of peo- 
ple of his nation, and his name is now enrolled among the best citizens of 
Lake county. 

LEWIS HAYDEN. 

Lewis Hayden is numbered among the early settlers of Lake county 
and is a retired farmer now living in Lowell. In fact, he is one of the native 
sons of this portion of the state, his birth having occurred in W'est Creek 
township, March 12, 1838. He is the eleventh of a family of thirteen chil- 
dren whose parents were Nehemiah and Harriet (Kitchell) Hayden. men- 
tion of whom is made on another page of this work in connection with the 
sketch of Jacob Hayden. Amid the wihl scenes of frontier life Lewis Hay- 
den was reared upon the old family homestead in \\'est Creek township. 
The settlements in northwestern Indiana were then widely scattered, and 
much of the land was still unimproved. Crude farm machinery was used 
in developing the fields, for the era of modern invention had not yet dawned 
resulting in the production of the modern agricultural implements that are 
to-day in use. Lewis Hayden performed his full share of the work on the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 523 

home farm, clearing the fields, planting the seed and harvesting the crops. 
He hauled wheat to Chicago with ox teams before there was any railroad, 
and he remained upon the home farm until the death of his father, when he 
started out in life on his own account. His educational privileges were such as 
were afforded in a log schoolhouse of that period. 

Mr. Hayden was united in marriage to jMiss Lucinda Knisely, and to 
them were Ixjrn two sons and a daughter, Sherman, Grant and Addie, but 
the last named is now deceased. The mother passed away January 5, 1867, 
and !Mr. Hayden afterward wedded Almeda Knisel}', a sister of his first 
wife. She was born in New Philadelphia, Tuscarawas county, Ohio, Oc- 
tober 16, 1846, and by her marriage she became the mother of ten children: 
Judson; Edward: Sylvia: Albert and .\lma twins: and Carrie, Mark, Bruce, 
Ruble and Blanche, all of whom are now deceased. .All were born in West 
Creek township and the living children are ail married with the exception of 
Albert. 

Mr. Hayden has spent his entire life in Lake county and during the 
greater part of the time has engaged in farming. He now owns two valuable 
farms comprising rich and productive land, one of which is two hundred and 
seventy-two acres in extent and the other one hundred and twenty acres. 
This land he rents, and it brings to him a good annual income. He him- 
self was actively engaged in farming until 1899, when he retired from busi- 
ness life and removed to Lowell. He had been very successful as an agri- 
culturist, had placed his fields under a high state of cultivation, and had an- 
nually garnered rich crops which found a ready sale on the market. He 
improved his farm by building fences and erecting a large modern residence, 
substantial barns and other outbuildings : in fact he added all modern ecjuip- 
ments and accessories to his place and his property is now very valuable. 
His political allegiance has ever been given to the Republican party, and 
upon that ticket he has been chosen for a number of local positions. He 
belongs to a family of nine brothers, who have contributed in large measure 
toward the improvement and progress of the southwestern part of Lake 
county. They own adjoining farming property in \\'est Creek township, and 
contril:iute in large measure to the agricultural interests of this portion of 
the state. They always favor general progress and improvement touching 
the interests of society at large, and Mr. Hayden has given his hearty co-op- 



52i HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

eration to many movements that have been of direct benefit to this portion 
of the state. 

OTTO C. BORMAN. 

Otto C. Borman, active and energetic in business affairs, has until re- 
cently been engaged in general merchandising and in milling at Tolieston. 
He is a young man who jMSsesses the enterprising spirit of the age, his 
birth having occurred in Tolieston on March 3, 1877. He is the fourth son 
of Christopher and Wilhelmina (Kurth) Borman, who were early residents 
of Lake county, coming here when this was largely a frontier district 
Otto C. Borman is indebted to the public school system for the educational 
advantages which he enjoyed, and he entered business life as a clerk in his 
father's store when a mere boy. He afterward went to Chicago, where he 
W'Orked for one year, and spent a similar period in Hammond. In 1898 he 
was united in marriage to Mrs. IT. F. Seegers, the widow of the late Henry 
F. Seegers, who was at that time engaged in business in Tolieston. Mr. 
Borman then conducted the business and developed this enterprise to good 
proportions, a large line of general merchandise being carried and a liberal 
patronage won through honorable methods and straightforward dealing. Mr. 
Borman was also engaged in conducting a flour and feed store, and was the 
leading real estate man of the town. 

To Mr. and Mrs. Borman has been born a daughter, Caroline, and 
there are three children by Mrs. Borman's former marriage, Laura, Renata 
and Hertha. In his political views Mr. Borman is a Democrat and is deeply 
interested in the success and growth of his party. He belongs to the German 
Lutheran church, and does everything in his power to promote general 
progress and improvement along material, social, intellectual and moral lines. 
He has an intimate knowledge of the history of the county for a quarter of 
a centiu-y or during the entire period of his life, and he is widely and favorably 
known in Tolieston and the surrounding districts. 

FRED T. BUSE. 

Energy and enterprise coupled with sagacity have made the successful 
business man Fred T. Buse and brought him to prominent rank among the 
citizens of Lake county as well as in the other places where his life of activity 
has been passed. He is now classed among the progressive and prosperous 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 525 

agriculturists of \\'est Creek tcwuship, and stands high in the estimation of 
all who know him. 

He is a native of Dubuque, Iowa, where he was born September 13, 
1863, being the fifth in a fanu'ly of seven children, five sons and two daugh- 
ters, born to Christian and Hannah (Ponta) Buse. Five of these children 
are yet li\ing: William, who is connected with the commercial activity of 
Dubuque, and is a man of family; Sena, wife of Henry Ehlers, who is con- 
nected with the police force in W'ashington, D. C. : Charles, a saleman in a 
hardware establishment at Dubuque, and also married : Fred T. ; and Ida K., 
wife of Robert Knoll, a machinist of Dubuque. The father and mother of 
this fa.mil}- were natives of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Germany, and the former 
was born May 9, 1826, and died July 4, 1900. He learned the trade of 
mechanic, and remained in his fatherland until he was a grown man. He 
served for four years in the German army. He came across the Atlantic in 
a sailing vessel, and from New York went to Cleveland, and thence to Louis- 
ville, Kentucky, and then followed the Mississippi as far north as Dubuque, 
where he permanently established himself. He was a stanch Republican, and 
he and his wife were members of the German Lutheran church. His wife, 
Mrs. Hannah Buse, was born April 11, 1827, and at the age of seventy-seven 
enjoys fine health. 

Mr. Fred T. Buse spent the early years of his life in Dubuque, and 
received his education in the city schools. At the age of sixteen he began his 
career by working for wages, and from a beginning without any money 
capital nor with any subsequent material assistance, he has attained by his 
own efforts an honorable and comfortable position in the world of affairs. 
He was in Dubuque until 1886, and then for two years he was employed as 
a brakeman on the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad, his run being 
from Savannah, Illinois, to La Crosse, Wisconsin. He was next a baggage 
master and express messenger for the same road until 1893, running from 
McGregor, Iowa, to La Crosse. Then for a year he was baggage master 
from Savannah to La Crosse, and during 1894 he weighed United States 
mail on the Milwaukee & St. Paul road from McGregor to Chicago. He was 
then on a way-freight of the same road during a part of 1895-96. 

October 2. 1895. he married Mrs. Grace M. (Bailey) Barhite. They 
have one son, Elliott E., born in Dubucjue, October 20, 1896, and who is 



526 HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 

now in the second grade of school. Mrs. Buse was born Jnne 5, 1867. being 
a daughter of Josiah B. and Nancy E. (Kile) Bailey — one of the oldest and 
most prominent families of Lake county and whose history appears on 
other pages of this work. Mrs. Buse was educated in the common schools 
of this county, and on December 21. 1887, was married to Adelbert Bar- 
hite. from which union there was one son, Ceylon A., who was born October 
18, 1888, and who recently graduated from the graded school of the town- 
ship and in 1904 entered the Lowell high school. 

After their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Buse were located in Dubuque for a 
time, and he was then engaged in the manufacture of harness at West 
Salem. Wisconsin, in the firm of Wakefield & Buse. He was also interested 
in the La Crosse Leather Company, and for a time was on the road for that 
concern, his territory fieing South Dakota, southern Minnesota and central 
Wisconsin. After about a year in this latter business he sold out his interests, 
and he and his wife then came to Lake county and located on the old Bailey 
homestead in West Creek township. This place is known as the Hickorj'^ 
Grove farm, and contains two hundred and eighty acres of as fine soil as can 
be found in Lake county. Not only the entire farmstead is a beautiful and 
profitable estate, but the home is one of comfort and cheer such as is not met 
with at every turn of the road. Mr. Buse is devoting much of his time and 
attention to the raising of Hereford cattle. He is an enthusiastic and pro- 
gressive agriculturist in the true sense of the word, and is interested not only 
in making his farm a source of profit but in causing it to be a property of 
beauty such as he or anyone might take pride to call his own. He has re- 
cently built a fine modern granary, forty by thirty-six feet, and twenty feet 
high, with concrete walls and floor, and also in the same style of construction 
is his tool shed, sixteen by forty feet. 

Mr. Buse is a stanch Republican, and cast his first presidential vote for 
James G. Blaine. He fraternizes with Lodge No. 300 of the Ivnights of 
Pythias at Lowell. 

JOSLAH B. BAILEY. 

In the death of Josiah B. Bailey, on November 25, 1902, the community 
of West Creek township lost one of its most esteemed and worthy citizens, a 
man of unimpeachable character, of serious mind and worth, and with an 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 527 

influence emanating" from liis personality tliat affected not alone his own 
family and circle of friends but all with whom he came in contact throughout 
his career. 

At the time of his death he was sixty-seven years, one month and two 
days old. He was horn at Door \'illage, LaPorte county. Indiana, October 
23, 1835. When he was a child he lost his father, and tlien went to make 
his home with his grandfather in Pulaski county, and some time later he 
accompanied his grandfather to Lake county and made this his home through- 
out the rest of his life, \\ ith the exception of two years spent in Kankakee 
county. Illinois. 

March ig, 1857, he was married to Miss Nancy E. Kile, who died 
April 18, 1876. There were four children liorn of this union, three sons 
and one daughter, as follows: Levi E., Charles T., George B., and Grace, 
who is the wife of Mr. Fred T. Buse, whose history is given above. In Feb- 
ruary, 1877, ]Mr. Bailey married ]\Irs. Amelia Sanger, who is still living. 
Mr. Bailey was also survived by a sister. Mrs. Mary E. Hamiltnn, of Minne- 
apolis, and by two brothers, S. T. Bailey, of Battle Grounds, Indiana, and 
O. L. Chapman of Coyville, Kansas. 

Mr Bailey's life was of tliat sturdy, upright character such as stands as 
its own justification and is the mark of the career of a good citizen. He had 
an inquiring and adaptive mind, and his constant desire to progress made 
him more than ordinarily successful as a farmer. His advice and opinion 
in matters of practical concern were often sought, and freely given. He 
was public-spirited in everything that concerned the welfare of his com- 
munity of \\^est Creek township, and his good citizenship here made him 
also a valuable unit and factor in the makeup of the state and nation. He 
served as supervisor of his township for some time, and during that time 
urged with all his power and official authority the building of gravel roads. 
He was of a sympathetic nature and was always ready to help those really 
in need. While not a memlier of any church, he was free an.d open-handed 
in his giving to the cause of Christianity. He was an attendant of the 
West Creek Methodist church, and the last rites were performed in that 
church. He was well known in the county and had many friends, and his 
death meant a personal loss to many outside the family circle that loved him 
so well. 



528 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

E. R. BACON, M. D. 

During the years which marked the period of Dr. Bacon's professional 
career he has met with gratifying success, and while a resident of Lake county 
he has won the good will and patronage of many of the best citizens of Lowell 
and the surrounding districts. He is a thorough student, and endea\'ors to 
keep abreast of the times in everything relating to the discoveries in medical 
science. Progressive in his ideas and favoring modern methods as a whole, 
he does not, however, dispense with the time-tried systems whose value has 
stood the test of years. He has a large practice, which is indicative of the 
Irust reposed in his professional skill, and so widely and favorably is he 
known that no history of the county would be complete withotit a record of 
his life. 

Dr. Bacon was born in Orleans county, New York, February 22, 1840. 
His father. Benjamin Bacon, was a native of Washington county. New York, 
and was a farmer ]>y occupation. He died in the Empire state in his seventy- 
fifth year. His wife died when the Doctor was only three years of age, and 
the boy was reared by B. G. Merrick. He pursued a common-school educa- 
tion and started out in life for himself at a very early age. When a young 
man of twenty-one years he responded to his country's call for troops, enlist- 
ing on the 24th of April, 1861, as a member of Company G, Second Michigan 
Vohuiteer Lifantry. He was a private and whh that command served for 
three n:onths. Li 1862 he re-enlisted in the One Hundredth Illinois Volun- 
teer Regiment and served for three years. In 1864 he was transferred to 
the regular army as ho-spital steward, and thus continued his connection with 
the Union troops until the fall of 1865, when he was discharged on a general 
war order. His clothing was pierced by five bullets at the battle of Chicka- 
mauga, but he sustained no personal injury. Diu'ing the years of his active 
service he was in many important ]:)att]es, and never faltered in the perform- 
ance of duty or in his allegiance to the old flag and the cause it represented. 

In May, 1866, Dr. Bacon came to Lowell, and here took up the study 
and practice of medicine. He had attended lectures at Nashville, Tennessee, 
during the war and had begun practice on his arrival in Lowell, at the same 
time continuing his reading in order to perfect his knowledge of the healing 
art. He is a graduate of the Chicago Medical College of the class of 1873, 
and has been in constant practice in Lowell for thirty-five years, during which 




/^ {S e^eed 



'CLG,<r-Z^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 529 

time iie has enjoyed a large patronage, and is now an extremely bnsv man. 
He is widely known as an industrious and ambitious student, and his profes- 
sional career has been marked by continuous advancement. He also has other 
interests in Lake county, being one of the directors of the State National 
Bank, of Lowell. He likewise owns farm property and real estate in Chicago. 

Oji the 3d of June. 1868, Dr. Bacon was united in marriage to Miss 
Martha B. Sanger, a daughter of James H. and Martha (Cleve.land) Sanger. 
Mrs. Bacon was born in Lake county and by her marriage has become the 
mother of two children : Sylvia L., who is the wife of S. C. Dwyer, an attorney 
at law of Lowell; and Grace M., the wife of Dr. A. L. Spindler, a dentist of 
Chicago Heights. 

Dr. Bacon is a member of the Knights of Pvthias fraternit^•, the IMasonic 
lodge and the Lidependent Order of Odd Fellows, and is now one of the 
trustees of the first named. He has been active and influential in community 
affairs, was a school director for eleven years and is now president of the 
pension board, of which he has been a member for thirteen years. His first 
presidential vote was proudly cast for Abraham Lincoln in i860, and since 
that time he has supported each presidential candidate of the Republican party. 
He belongs to the Methodist Episcopal church, takes a very active and helpful 
p:irt in its work and has served as one of the church trustees for thirteen 
years. Dr. Bacon has been the builder of his own character as well as his owr 
fortune. He started out in life for himself at an early age, and is a self- 
educated as well as self-made man. In his profession he has gained prom- 
inence and success and in private life he has won that warm personal regard 
which is the evidence of many sterling traits of character. 

BERNARD F. CARLIN. 

Emerson, the Sage of Concord, has said that the true history of a nation 
is best told in the lives .of its aggressive and progressive citizens, and what 
is true of a nation is likewise true of the units of a nation, the county and 
township. Lake county has reason to congratulate herself because of a man 
of this type who has recently located within the county boundaries, for in 
Mr. Bernard F. Carlin are found the qualities which make for success per- 
sonally and collectively and which are beneficial to the general tone and 
standard of any community. Coming as he does from the great agricultural 
34 



530 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

state of Illinois, Mr. Carlin will l^e in his proper element as a factor in the 
rich agricultural enterprises of Lake county, and will make his influence felt 
not only in a personal way and as a public-spirited citizen but as a power and 
producer of wealth in the material affairs of the county. 

Mr. Carlin was born in Lexington, IMcLean county, Illinois, May 8, 
1869, and is the fifth in a family of eight children, four sons and four daugli- 
ters, born to Bernard and Bridget (Murray) Carlin. Si.x of this family are 
still living: Anna is the wife of P. H. O'Neill, a wealthy stockman of 
Faulkton, South Dakota, and they have five children ; Patrick J. is in the 
real estate and insurance business at Kankakee, Illinois, and he married 
Miss Carrie Klein; Mary is the wife of J. E. Herrington, a farmer at Fair- 
^'iiry, Illinois, and has three daughters ; Bernard and Katie are twins, and 
Ihe latter is the wife of John P. Degnan, of West Creek township, and has 
two children ; John, the youngest, is also in the real estate and insurance busi- 
ness at Kankakee. 

The life of Mr. Carlin's father is an interesting narrati\-e of self-achieved 
success. The senior Bernard Carlin was born in county Mayo, Ireland, in 
1830, and is now living in advanced age in Fairbury, Illinois. At the age 
of twenty-two he set sail from his native land and landed in New York, a 
stranger in a foreign land, with less than twenty-five dollars in his pocket. 
For a time he was a wage-earner in Philadelphia at fifty-five cents a day. 
In 1854 he came to Chicago, when that then small city lacked fifty years 
of growth before it should become the present-day metropolis. From there 
he sought employment in New' Orleans, and after eight months arrived in 
Bloomington, Illinois, in 1855, where he remained until 1862. In the latter 
year he came to Lexington, Illinois, and began saw ing wood for the Chicago 
& Alton Railroad. He was always willing to accept any labor that would 
earn an honest dollar, and his industr\' and perseverance are the grounds 
for his success. He lived at Lexington until 1870,- and during four years 
of this time he was engaged in farming. In 1859 he had married Miss 
Bridget Murray, who was born in Gahvay, Ireland, and who died October 
3, 1894, when nearly sixty years tild. Both he and his wife were devout 
Catholics, and he assisted in the buikling of St. Joseph's church at Chenoa, 
Illinois, where he lived so many years. In politics he still casts his vote for 
the Democratic candidates. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. ' 531 

Mr. Bernard F. Carlin was reared in Chenoa, Illinois, and besides a good 
practical education in the public schools he took the teacher's course at Val- 
paraiso College for two years. In 1895 lie and his brother Patrick began 
dealing in live stock and in the butcher business at Chenoa, and continued that 
with success beyond their expectations until 1899. In No\'ember, 1899, Mr. 
Carlin embarked in the grocery business at Fairbury. with his brother John, 
and continued this line of enterprise also \ery successfully for three years. 
While in this business he and his brother purchased seven hundred acres of 
land in \\'est Creek township, Lake county, antl it is to a part of this that Mr. 
Carlin has recently decided to devote his attention as a practical farmer. 
Prior to this purchase of Lake county land he and his brother had bought 
out the interests of the other heirs in the old homestead in Li\ingston county. 
Illinois, but they have since disposed of this property. 

September 5, 1899, Mr. Carlin married Miss Katie F. White, and the}- 
are the parents of three children, Katherine, John B. and Walter P. Mrs. 
Carlin was born in Lexington, Illinois, June 26, 1873, being a daughter of 
John and Katherine (Doody) White. There were four daughters in the 
family, and two besides Mrs. Carlin are living : Anna, who was educated in 
the public schools, is a resident of Lexington, Illinois ; Mary, who was edu- 
cated in the Lexington high school and completed all but three months of the 
course at the Illinois State Normal University, is a resident of Lexington, 
and is a teacher in the public schools of Pontiac. Mrs. Carlin was reared in 
the vicinity of Lexington, receiving her educatimi in the schools of that citv, 
and for seven years was a teacher in the McLean county schools. Her 
father, John White, was born in county Tipperary, Ireland, in 1821, and is 
living at the present writing in Lexington, being eighty-three years old. He 
came to America in young manhood, landing in this country with but a 
shilling to his name, and the greater part of his life has been spent in the 
employ of the Chicago and Alton Railroad. He has also followed farming, 
and has been very successful in his life work. He is a Democrat in politics. 
His wife was born in Queen's county, Ireland, in 1844, and came to America 
when she was two years old. She died June i, 1904. 

Just before disposing of his business interests in Fairbury, Mr. Carlin 
was appointed joint agent of the Pacific and the Adams express companies 
at that place, and remained in that capacity one year. He resigned April 16, 



532 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

1903, and took a district agency for the Continental Insurance Company, and 
continued in this husiness until November, 1903. At the latter date he and 
his family located in West Creek township. Lake county, and during the past 
year he has been devoting his time and attention to farming and stock-raising, 
which pursuits he intends to carry on perhaps permanently. His favorite 
stock are the Durham cattle and the Poland China hogs. He has already 
shown great sagacity in the management of his enterprises, and is taking full 
advantage of the great opportunities offered to the stockman and farmer of 
Lake county. 

Mr. Carlin is inde]iendent in politics, r.nd usually scratches his ballot 
according to his own best judgment of the men and principles at stake. 
Fraternally he is a member of the Court of Honor No. 206, at Fairbury, and 
the Yeomen of America in the same place. He and his wife are members 
of the Catholic church at Lowell. 

DAVID C. PULVER. 

There are few living Lake county citizens who can claim their birth as 
having taken place in this county over sixty vears ago, and among that few 
is Mr. D. C. Puher. He and his noble wife are held in the highest esteem 
by all who know them, and they have made themselves factors of influence 
and worth ever since entering upon their active careers in this county. 

Mr. Pulver was born May 21, 1842, and is the youngest of the seven 
children, four sons and three daughters, born to David and Mercy (Tobias) 
Pulver. Besides himself, there are two of the children still living, as follows : 
Eunice, the wife of Edward Ashton, of Lowell; and Lodemia, wife of Henry 
Farrington, of Wessington, South Dakota. The father of the family w-as 
born in Pennsylvania in 1795, four years tefore the death of General Wash- 
ington, and died December 27. 1843. He was reared to farming pursuits, 
and educated in the old-time schools existing during the earliest years of the 
past century. His death occurred when his son David was Ijut six months 
old, so that the latter never knew the energizing influence of his father. The 
mother of Mr. D. C. Pulver, also a native of Pennsylvania, was born Sep- 
tember 2, 1805. and died October 24, 1881. she and her husband being married 
on November 5, 1826. In the year 184T this worthy couple came west and 
took up their residence in Lake county, at a time when the country hereabout 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTV. 533 

was practically a wilderness. David Pulver bought one hundred and ten 
acres of raw land in West Creek township, and the first home that sheltered 
the family was a log cabin. In those early days, about the time when David C. 
was a baby, the Indians were still roaming freely over this part of north- 
western Indiana, and one day the red men came to the Puh'er home and stole 
the daughter Eunice, keeping her in their possession for two or three hours 
before she could be rescued. Deer often fled across the premises, and the 
howl of the wolf could be heard for many years after their settlement. The 
town of Lowell had not yet been founded, and while there are now nearly 
twenty important railroads through the county, the boy David had attained 
the age of eight or nine years before the wild shriek of the ]ocomoti\'e roused 
the echoes with its unwonted soimd. 

Mr, Pulver was thus born and reared in Lake county and has made his 
home in West Creek township all his life. He was educated in such schools 
as were common in this county during his youth, and he still distinctly recalls 
the little log cabin school which stood half a mile from the old homestead. It 
was about fourteen by eighteen feet in size, was roofed over with the pioneer 
"shakes" as the rough predecessor of shingles. The seats were rough slabs 
supported by four legs, and the desk for the larger pupils was a board extend- 
ing around tb.e room. The Inn'lding was heated with a cast-iron stove. Both 
Mr. and Mrs. Pulver have used the old-fashioned goosequill pens, and tb.eir 
lives are a strange blending of the pioneer experiences with twentieth century 
prosperity and convenience. 

]\Ir. Pulver remained at home and cared for his mother until her death. 
On Februarv 2t,. i86y, he vv-as united in marriage with Miss Ursula Vandecar, 
and the li\-e children born to tliis union are as follows : Cora, who was edu- 
cated in the common schools and was a teacher for three years in Lake 
county, is the wife of E. Van Alstine, a fanner of Roanoke, Huntington 
county, Indiana, and they have three children, Oakes. Ursula and Elton. 
Charles W., who after the public school education took the normal course at 
Valparaiso College, learned the jeweler's trade at the big watch factory al 
Elgin.. Illinois, and is now a successful merchant of Lowell : he married Miss 
Edith Hull. Lura completed the eighth grade of school work and is now 
the wife of Jodie Hayden, a prosperous farmer of West Creek township. 
Earle. at home, has also completed the eighth grade. Jessie, at home, did. 



534 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

in addition to tlie work of the common schools, one year's work in the Lowell 
high school. Mrs. Pulver was born in Cedar Creek township, Lake county, 
June 15. 1847, heing a daughter of Peter and Wealthy (Clark) Vandecar. 
There were just two children, and her sister is Lovisa, wife of William Hal- 
stead, a farmer at Topeka, Kansas. Mrs. Pulver was reared and has spent all 
her life in this county. She is a lady of cordial greeting and accomplished 
in the best activities of the world, and has been an able helpmate to her 
husband. 

Mr. Pulver was among the Lake county citizens who offered their serv- 
ices during the great rebellion. August 9, 1862, he enlisted at Lowell, in 
Company A, Seventy-third Indiana Volunteers, under Captain Fry. The 
regiment was organized at South Bend, and was sent to Louisville, Kentucky. 
He was under the command of General Sherman during his army career. He 
was taken sick at Siloam Springs, Tennessee, and was forced to lea\e the 
service permanently, being finally discharged March 9, 1863. 

Mr. Pulver is a stalwart Republican, and since casting his first ])resi- 
dential vote for Lincoln has supported every candidate of the Grand Old 
Party. He is a member of the Grand Army post at Lowell. Mrs. Pulver is 
a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and he has contributed his 
share to the benevolences and charity. Mr. and Mrs. Pulver have lived in 
this county so long that not only have they been witnesses to its growth and 
development from a wild country, Imt they themselves are well known and 
held in highest esteem throughout the county. They have a most hospitable 
home, and it is ever open to their many friends. They have in their possession 
one of the oldest Bibles in the county, one that was published in 181 7. 
Another valuable heirloom from the preceding generation is one of the old 
double coverlets, woven by his mother fully three quarters of a century ago. 
Mrs. Pulver has a silver cup that has been handed down from generation to 
generation, it having been made in Sweden as far back as the seven- 
teenth century. 

SAMUEL A. LOVE. 

Samuel A. Love, of the well-known firm of Love Brothers (Samuel A. 
and James H.) at Leroy, belongs to the representative class of citizens in 
whose personal histories, as the sage of Concord has said, lies the truest 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 535 

history of community, state or nation. IMr. Love has passed so many years 
in Lake county, lias enjoyed such a high reputation as citizen and business 
man. and become so well known to all that no introduction is necessary to 
place his real character before the mind of Lake county people. 

He was born on St. Martin's island in Lake Michigan, on ALarch 17. 
1859, and is the fourth in the family of eight children, five sons and three 
daughters, born to Samuel and Ellen Jane (Mundall) Love. J. E. Love, 
of Lowell, who is represented elsewhere in this volume, is the eldest of the 
six living children; ^\'illiam is a hay merchant at Lowell: Samuel A. is the 
next oldest; ]\lary A. is the wife of A. M. Phillips, a farmer of Winfiekl 
township; James H.. the other member of the firm of Love Brothers, and 
present trustee of Winfield township, is also given place in this history; and 
Peter K.. the youngest, is a farmer of Winfield township. 

The father oi the family, Samuel Love, was a Scotch-L'ishman, born 
in Ireland about 1830, and he lived to be seventy-two years of age. He 
was reared in his native land and before coming to America followed the 
trade of weaver. When he came to this country he was without money, but 
with a large stock of honest industry, and he maintained an honorable posi- 
tion in the world. He came west and made his home in Detroit for a time, 
and was a sailor on the great lakes and also a fisherman. He located in 
Cedar Creek township. Lake county, about 1868, purchasing real estate near 
Creston, and he resided there five or six years before making his final abode 
in \\'infield township, where he spent the rest of his life. He was an ardent 
Republican in politics, and had formerly been a Whig. He supported all 
enterprises for the public welfare, and was especially interested in the promo- 
tion of temperance. He and his wife were members of the Methodist 
Episcopal church, aiding in the erection of their local edifice. I\Irs. Love, 
the mother, was born in the same part of Ireland as was her husband, also 
about 1830, and is now living at Leroy at the age of seventy-four years. 

Mr. Love became a resident of Lake county when about ten years old, 
so that his entire active career has been spent in the county. He was brought 
up and remained on the farm until he was seventeen years old. and since 
then has been engaged continuously in the mercantile business. His educa- 
tion was obtained in the local schools, and personal application was the source 
of his best advancement. At the age of seventeen he became associated in 



536 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

business with his father, and continued so until he was thirty-one years old. 
In 1890 he and his brothers James H. and P. K. formed a partnership and 
went into the hay and grain business, and the style of the firm has since been 
known as Love Brothers, although P. K. has since retired. The people of 
Leroy and surrounding country appreciated the fair dealing and the enter- 
prising spirit of the brothers, and their business has been throughout large 
and successful. In recent years they also buy and sell live stock. 

Mr. Love's wife was Miss Matilda J. Stewart, and they had three 
children, the two now living being Marguerite, who is in the fifth grade of 
school and has taken music, and Samuel A., Jr. ;\Irs. Love is a native of 
Lake county, was educated in the common schools and the Crown Point high 
school, and for some years before her marriage was a successful teacher in 
the county. She was a daughter of Charles and Rebecca (Simpson) Stewart, 
her father being deceased and her mother a resident of Leroy. 

Mr. Love is a Repulilican, and has supported true Republicanism since 
casting his first vote for Garfield and has been active in local party and 
public affairs. He was elected to the office of township assessor, and before 
his term expired, in 1887, he was elected trustee, holding that office seven 
years and five months. In 1900 he was elected county commissioner, which 
is the most responsible office in the county. During his term of office he was 
a moving spirit in the erection of the one hundred thousand dollar court 
house at Hammond, also in effecting many repairs and improvements to the 
county building at Crown Point. The county affairs, both fiscal and admin- 
istrative, are in the best condition of their history, and, with the Hammond 
court house finished and out of debt, the county levy has been reduced from 
twenty-five and a quarter to si.xteen and a quarter cents on the hundred 
dollars, wliich is certainly a good showing for Lake county. INIr. Love 
fraternizes with the I. O. O. F., Lodge No. 195, at Crown Point, and with 
Court No. 17 of the Independent Order of Foresters at Leroy. Both he and 
his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal church, and he is a steward 
and also the present superintendent of the Sunday school. 

JAMES H. LOVE. 

In the various members of the Love family Lake county has found 
during the last thirty-fi\-e or forty years some of its most excellent types 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 537 

of citizenship and manhood, and one of ihe most progressive of these is 
Mr. James H. Love, of the firm of Love Brotliers. dealers in hay, grain and 
Vixe stock at Leroy. Mr. Love lias lived in this county practically all his 
life, and besides proving his ability and enterprise as a business man has 
also made himself especially useful to his township in the office of trustee, 
whicli position he holds at the present writing. 

Mr. Love was born at Washington Harbor, Michigan, August 27, 1864, 
and is the sixth of the eight children born to Samuel and Ellen Jane 
(Mundall) Love. In the life history of the uther member of Love Brothers, 
namely, Samuel A., will be found further particulars concerning this family, 
of which both parents and children have played such useful parts in the 
affairs of the county. 

Mr. Love was about six years old when his father and mother moved 
from Michigan and took up their residence on a farm near Creston in Cedar 
Creek township, this county, whence later they moved to Winfield township. 
James H. Love received a practical training in the public schools of the 
country and at Crown Point, and as he was reared on a farm he gained 
experience in agricultural affairs. Like his brother Samuel he was asso- 
ciated in business with his father for a time, and when he was twenty-six 
years old he entered into business with his brothers Samuel and Peter. 
Peter has since left the firm, and the extensive trade is now carried on as 
Love Brothers. Theirs is one of the foremost enterprises of the kind in the 
east part of the countv. and the annual volume of business transacted is a 
credit to the enterprising brothers, who have built up a substantial success 
by their own well directed endeavors. Besides his connection with the 
business Mr. Love owns a good residence in the town of Leroy and also one 
hundred and twenty acres of excellent land in Eagle Creek township. 

March 29, 1888. Mr. Love married Miss Sallie B. McKnight. and three 
children were born to them, the two living being: Rosa E., who is in the 
eighth grade of school and has taken music: and Mary Ellen, who is the 
baby of the household. Mrs. Love was born in Lake county and was reared 
and educated here, and her parents, James and Belle (Stewart) McKnight, 
are still li\ing and residents of Leroy. Her father was liorn in Pennsylvania, 
and was a member of the famous old Ninth Indiana Regiment during the 



538 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Civil war, having veteranized and served till the close of hostilities. He is 
a Republican in politics. 

Mr. Love cast his first presidential vote tor Benjamin Harrison, and 
has stanchl)^ upheld the principles of the Grand Old Party ever since. He 
was elected a trustee of Winfield township in 1900, and is the present 
incumbent of that office. He has erected two new schoolhouses, has put in 
six stone arches for bridges besides two wooden bridges, and has handled 
the administrative affairs of his township in a way to reflect o-reatest credit 
upon his official term. The finances of both township and county are now 
in excellent shape, and through the loyal efforts of such officials as Mr. Love 
Lake county presents a history of sound and substantial public administra- 
tion. Mr. Love affiliates with the Knights of Pythias, Castle Hall No. 405, 
at Hebron, and is one of the trustees. He is a member of the Independent 
Order of Foresters, being on the high board of directors for the state of 
Indiana. Mr. and Mrs. Lo\-e are both worthy members of the Methodist 
Episcopal church at Leroy. 

WELLINGTON A. CLARK. 

Among the real pioneers of Lake county — that is, those settlers who 
were twenty-one years old before 1840 — so far as is known to the Historical 
Association of Old Settlers, one only is now living, Mr. Wellington A. 
Clark. A descendant of pioneers from Berkshire, Massachusetts, who 
formed in Ontario county. New York, the settlement that became Naples *" 
in New York, a company of sixty New Englanders making that settlement 
in J 789. it was very appropriate that \\'. .\. Clark should become a pioneer 
in Indiana. 

W. A. Clark was born in Naples, New A'urk. Septemljer j, 181 5. Fie 
was a son of Benjamin Clark and Thankful Watkins, whose marriage was 
the first to take place in that early settlement which is now Naples, his father 
erecting the first grist mill there in 1795 or 1796. The tradition is that his 
mother's ancestors came over in the Mayflower, but the full line has not been 
made out. His father vvas a soldier and became an officer in the Revolu- 
tionary war. He is of good New England Puritan, perhaps Pilgrim, 
descent. He entered luisiness life as a clerk in a wholesale grocery store in 
Albanv. An older brother. Sanford D. Clark, was then a thrixing merchant 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 639 

in Ohio, and as the result of a visit to that brother in 1837 or more probably 
in 1838; W. A. Clark made a lake \-oyage to Chicago, and tlien made a trip 
into the new Lake county, where he found some accjuaintances and relatives, 
especially Adin Sanger, also Ephraim Cleveland, and others. Arrange- 
ments were made for a claim to be entered and bought in his name. He 
returned to the east, and among the names of settlers in West Creek town- 
ship for 1839 is found the name Wellington A. Clark. He came through 
from the east this time across the country in a buggy, and commenced in 
the fall of 1839 to improve his West Creek farm where had been entered 
for him at the land sale "three hundred and eight-four acres." In Decem- 
ber, 1843, he was married to an estimable young woman. Miss Mary C. 
Hackley, a member of a family of early settlers residing a little north of the 
present village of Hanover Center. This marriage was solemnized by 
Judge Robert Wilkinson, a settler on West Creek in 1835, and who, in 
true pioneer style, took his rifle v.ith him to go up through the woodland 
that skirted the west border of Lake Prairie, and with it shot a fine deer 
when near the home of the bride. 

.■\bout 1846, leaving farming for a time, W. A. Clark removed with his 
then young wife to Crown Point, became agent for some large eastern 
houses, especially Ayers of Lowell, traveled considerably over the state, and 
made money. 

The following paragraph is quoted from a record made in 1872 and 
is believed to be thoroughly correct : "At Crown Point he built a good 
dwelling house: returned to his farm and built an excellent farmhouse: spent 
again a few years, including 1864 and 1865, at Crown Point: and once more 
returned to the West Creek home. In 1867 he erected and started the first 
cheese factory in the county : kept, some of the time, one hundred cows ; 
became owner of a thousand acres north of Crciwn Point, and made improve- 
ments at the home place. In 1869 or 1870 he disposed of the thousand acres 
near Crown Point and now holds (1872) his West Creek lands, in amount 
thirteen hundred and twenty acres." At this time he was considered to be 
one of the wealthiest citizens of the county and his property, accumulated 
in some thirty years, was considered to be worth fifty thousand dollars. He 
at length ga\'e up dair^-ing and farming, and returned to his Crown Point 
home. He was at this time, 1875, sixty years of age, and for the last period 



540 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

of his life, now almost thirty years, he has heen a constant resident in Crown 
Point. He has been content to remain in that "good dwelling house," one 
of the best in the town when it was erected, while many quite costly men- 
sions of wood and brick have in these later years gone up around him. His 
home is a landmark of the earlier years. 

In all this period of retirement from farming he has been an active 
busines,'; man, having an office where he may be found almost every day. a 
dealer in real estate, selling farms and town property, and negotiating loans. 
During his earlier residence in Crown Point he took large interest in church 
and school matters, as one of New England descent might be expected to do : 
and in 1875 he was largely instrumental in the organization of an associa- 
tion for the pioneers and early settlers of the county. Of this organization, 
now called the Old Settler and Historical Association, he was the first presi- 
dent, delivered the inaugural address at what was then the fair ground, 
September 25, 1875, at the first annual gathering of the pioneers, and has 
held the same office for twenty years. He has done much to keep ali\e the 
interest in the organization. He has done quite an amount of writing for 
the pa]iers of Crown Point, dealing, not with the political and social ques- 
tions of the day, but rather with early American history, Spanish and French 
explorers and missionaries, and their early voyages, travels, and settlements. 
Manv of these articles may be found in the Crown Point Register as late as 
in the year 1904. Few men in their eighty-ninth year do such writing. 
In 1876 he visited Philadelphia and on his return wrote quite a description 
of that Centennial. As a political newspaper correspondent may te placed 
first. Hon. Bartlett Woods: for a writer of long poems. John Underwood: 
but as a historical newspaper writer of Lake county, W. A. Clark stands first. 

A semi-centennial celebration of the first Masonic lodge of Lake county 
was held in May. 1904. and he was found to be one of two survivors of the 
charter members. In 1889 a centennial celebration was held in Naples. 
New York, and he was named as one of three then known to be living of 
the children of the first settlers of Naples. He is quite surely the only one 
now. According to the dates given in the records, it was fifty years liefore 
that centennial, and so fifty years from the time of his father's settlement 
at Naples, when, in 1839. he became a pioneer settler in Lake county. .\nd 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 541 

now, of all his fellow-pioneers, he is left alone. Mr. Clark is honorary vice 
president of the Sons of American Revolntion for Indiana. 

A few particulars in regard to his family may be added to this sketch. 
Mrs. Mary Hackley Clark still li\-es, sixty years older than she was in 1843, 
but still cheerful and cheery, sprightly in mind, a noble-heartecl and a devoted 
Christian woman. Two sons were given to them. The older one, Henry 
Clark, married, commenced business in South Chicago, and soon died, leaving 
two children, of whom one is now Mrs. Claribelle Rockwell, of Crown Point, 
and the other, a son, is not in this county. The younger of the two sons 
of Mr. and Mrs. Clark, known as Fred Clark, a promising youth, died of 
typhoid fever while studying the science of medicine. They have one 
daughter. Helen, a charming, intelligent, lovely girl, who married, and has 
three daughters and one son, all married and settled in life, and she herself 
has returned to the Crown Point home to care, as a dutiful daughter, for 
her aged father and mother. The family attend and help to keep up the 
Presbyterian church. 

Note. — December 7, 1893, soon after the close of the Columbian Exposi- 
tion, Mr. and Mrs. Clark celebrated the golden anniversary of their mar- 
riage, when, among other exercises, a paper was read by their friend, T. H. 
Ball, an acquaintance and friend for fifty years, that paper consisting of ten 
quite closely written manuscript pages, descriptive and historical, that cele- 
bration being then considered, as it most probably was, the first "golden 
wedding" of Lake county. 

EDWIN S. GILBERT. 

Edwin S. Gilbert, postmaster, editor and business man of Indiana Har- 
bor, is one of the enterprising citizens of this most enterprising town. When 
Indiana Harbor began to come into prominence as a commercial center he 
recognized its opportunities and advantages, and has been identified with its 
progress ever since. He has been in charge of the postoffice since its estab- 
lishment, and he issued the first paper in the place. He is eminently [lublic- 
spirited and truly representative of the energy and business push which are 
going to make this young trade center of northern Lake county one of the 
foremost harbor cities about Lake Michigan. 

Mr. Gilbert was born in Ash Grove, Iroquois county, Illinois, February 



642 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

5, 1862, a son of Theodore ilonroe and Hannah (McDonough) Gilbert, the 
former a native of Connecticut and the latter of Delaware. His paternal 
grandfather was Asa Gilbert, a native of Connecticut and of English descent. 
He came west to Michigan and owned and operated lumber mills, and in 
Ohio had some flouring mills and in 1830 built a canal in that state. He 
rafted the first cargo of lumber from ^lichigan to Chicago. He later moved 
to Illinois, and died while on a visit to one of his children in Indiana, when 
upward of sixty years of age. His wife was named Abigail, and they had 
five sons and one daughter. Mr. Gilbert's maternal grandfather was John 
Stidham, a native of Maryland. He was an early settler in Iroquois county, 
Illinois, where he owned six hundred acres of land, and he died there well 
advanced in years. He was one of the prominent men of the county. His 
first wife was named Pennington and his second Bonebrake. 

Theodore M. Gilbert, the father of Edwin S., was a farmer by occupa- 
tion. He emigrated to Illinois some time in the fifties, and settled at Ash 
Grove, where he improved and lived on a farm for a time, but later sold and 
moved into Onarga, where he was engaged in the grocery business for a 
number of years. He died at Onarga in 1896, aged seventy-two years. He 
held the office of assessor of his county for a number of terms. His wife still 
survives him. at the age of eighty-one years. She. as was her husband, is a 
member of the ^Methodist church. They were the parents of ten children, 
five sons and five daughters, eight of whom are now living: John S.. of 
Onarga, Illinois; Erastus P.. of the state of Washington; Evaline. wife of 
Charles H. Pusey, of Oberlin, Kansas; Miss Jennie, of Onarga; Abigail, 
wife of John K. Judy, of Goodwin, Illinois: Alice, wife of A\^esley Harris, 
of Oberlin, Kansas: Dwight !\1.. of W'ashir.gton state: and Edwin S. 

Mr. Edwin S. Gilbert lived on his father's farm until he was fourteen 
years old. getting his schooling in the district schools. He then went to 
school in Onarga for a time, after which he learned the printer's trade, which 
with its allied profession has been his principal occupation throughout his 
active career. For one year he published the Onarga Rcviczi.'. and for the 
following three years conducted a paper in North Dakota. On his return 
to Onarga he established the Leader and published it for three years. After 
his marriage, in 1888. he lived in the Dakotas for several years, and on 
January 17, 1891, established the Globe at East Chicago, Indiana. He con- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 543 

ducted tliis paper until August, 1899, when he sold the plant to the present 
owner. A. P. Brown. For a short time following he was employed at his 
printing trade, and then bought the \Miiting Xczcs, which he still publishes 
in addition to the Saturday issue of the Indiana Harbor AVics". the first jour- 
nal to make its appearance in this town. 

^\'hen the postoffice was established at Indiana Harbor on February 17, 
1902, ]\Ir. Gilbert became the first postmaster, and on its becoming a presi- 
dential office, January i. 1904, he was reappointed postmaster. He was 
city clerk of East Chicago for two terms. He owns a residence in East 
Chicago, and is now building a double store building with five flats in Indiana 
Harbor. He is a Republican in politics. He affiliates with the Knights of 
Pythias, and has been keeper of records and seals since the lodge was insti- 
tuted in East Chicago four years ago. He and his wife are members of the 
ilethodist Episcopal church. 

June 21. 1888. ]\Ir. Gilbert married Miss Kate A. Lowe, a daughter of 
Samuel and Eliza (Beattie) Lowe. 

DR. ROBERT AUSLEY. 

Dr. Robert Ausley, physician and surgeon of Indiana Harbor, has been 
there almost as long as the town itself, and besides taking a foremost position 
in his professional work is also a man of influence in all that pertains to 
the development and welfare of this harbor city of Lake county. His life 
of less than a third of a century has lieen filled with activity, and besides 
the full complement of school days and the last two or three years devoted 
to his profession he had much experience in different parts of the country en- 
gaged in civil engineering, and is also one of the veterans of the Spanish- 
American war. 

Dr. Ausley was born in W'aldron, Illinois, November 4, 1S72, a son of 
Elmon and Elizabeth (Kibbons) Ausley, the former a native of Michigan 
and the latter of Illinois. He has two brothers. Howard and Charles, the 
latter of Valparaiso, Indiana. He is descended on his paternal side from 
one of three brothers who came from Scotland to America many years ago. 
His grandfather was a native of New York state, a farmer by occupation, and 
died in middle life, having been the father of two children. Dr. Ausley's 
father was a soldier during the Civil war, enlisting from Alichigan. and after 



544 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

the war he settled near Waldroii, Ilhnois, and later in Westville, LaPorte 
county, Indiana. He now spends his winters in the south and the summers 
in the north. He is a Mason and in politics a Republican, and his wife is 
a Methodist. His wife's father was a native of Virginia, and settled in 
Illinois in 183 1, dying in that state at the age of sixty years. He was a 
prominent farmer and justice of the peace. By his wife, Catherine Custer, 
he had a large family. 

Dr. Ausley spent his boyhood days in Westville, Indiana, where he 
attended the public schools and graduated from the well known high school 
in 1887. He then entered Valparaiso College, from which he graduated in 
1889. For about a year he was in Wyoming as civil engineer for the B. & M. 
Railroad. He returned home in 1890 and obtained election as county sur- 
veyor and drainage commissioner of LaPorte county, being elected at the age 
of twenty-one years to that important office, and he was re-elected and served 
in all four years. Pie then entered Rush Medical College at Chicago, but 
before he had completed his course the war with Spain broke out, and he at 
once enlisted. He was made quartermaster sergeant of Company L, One 
Hundred and Sixty-first Indiana Infantry, was sent to Cuba, and remained 
in the service till the close of the war. On his return he resumed his studies 
at Rush Medical College, from which he was graduated in the spring of 
1902. In th'e following fall he established his office and practice in Indiana 
Harbor, and has built up a very satisfactory and profitalile patronage in town 
and the surrounding country. 

Dr. Ausley is a member of the Lake County Medical Society, the Indiana 
State Medical Association, the Kankakee Valley Medical Association and the 
American Medical Association. In politics he is a Republican, and his fra- 
ternal affiliations are with the Masons, the Knights of the Maccabees and the 
Independent Order of Foresters. He resides and owns a good home at 3515 
Grapevine street. December 28, 1897, he was married to Miss Pearl Gardner, 
a daughter of Jared Gardner. 

OZRO METCALF. 

Ozro Metcalf, now deceased, was born ni Cataraugus county, New York, 
and when sixteen years of age came to Lake county, Indiana, being among its 
early settlers. He found that pioneer conditions existed here at the time of 




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OZRO METCALF 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 545 

his arrival, for much of tiie land was still unclaimed and uncultivated, and the 
homes of the settlers were widely scattered, save that here and there a little 
village had sprung up and population was more congested in those districts. 
Mr. Metcalf came to Indiana with his uncle and settled in Eagle Creek town- 
ship. In 1855 he removed to Cedar Creek township, where he was continu- 
ously engaged in agricultural pursuits up to the time of his death, covering a 
period of forty-fi\e years. 

l\lv. ^letcalf was united in marriage to Miss Clarissa M. Haskin, who 
was born in Geauga county, Ohio, May 22, 1837. Her father, Abile Haskin, 
was a native of New York, and became one of the early settlers of the Buck- 
eye state. His last days, however, were passed in Michigan, \\here he died 
at the age of fifty-six years. He had married Clarissa Custer, a native of 
New York, who died in Lake county, Indiana, in her seventy-seventh year. 
They were the parents of six children, three sons and three daughters, all of 
whom reached mature }'ears, while only two of the family are now living, the 
brother of Mrs. Metcalf being Nichols Haskin, who resides in Kansas. Mrs. 
Metcalf was the youngest of these children, and came to Lake county when 
but five years old, with her mother. Here she has since lived. She was 
married in 1855, anil this union has been blessed with two daughters and twc 

sons: Clarissa L. is now the wife of William Northrup, their marriage being 
celebrated Fel)ruary 14, 1S78, and their children are Loris; Morton O., who 
died October 29, 1889; Ora; Lulu: and John O. Byron Metcalf is a resident 
farmer of Center Creek township. Lottie is the deceased wife of Fred M. 
Buckley. Ordel died in infancy. 

Politically Mr. Metcalf was a life-long Republican, and belonged to the 
Methodist Episcopal churcl^ exemplifying in his life its teachings and belief. 
He was long a resident of Lake county, and was widely known as a man of 
unfaltering honor and inflexible integrity. He died at the age of seventy- 
one years, respected by all who knew him. Mrs. Metcalf still owns a farm of 
thirtv-two acres in Cedar Creek township, also another tract containing forty- 
three acres. She likewise has fifteen acres at Lowell. In the management 
of her property she displays good business ability, and it returns to her a 
gratifying income. Her father was a minister of the Methodist Episcopal 
church, and in that faith she was reared. She has long been identified with 
the denomination and is a most earnest Christian woman, whose many excel- 

35 



546 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

lent traits of cliaracter !ia\-e won for lier the esteem and friendshii) of all 
"with whom she has been associated. 

DR. HARRY E. SHARRER. 

Dr. Harry E. Sharrer, for nearly a decade a leading physician and sur- 
geon of Hammond, Indiana, is a man of striking personality and high profes- 
sional ability, and has made his inark in this thriving Lake county town in 
many different ways. He took up the practice oi medicine in Hammond 
almost immediately after his graduation at an earlv age fri:)m college, and 
in the few years that have since elapsed has risen to a foremost jilace in the 
ranks of the medical fraternity. Dr. Sharrer is a young man of great versa- 
tility of talents, and while he has done well to reach his present prominence 
as a physician and surgeon, his accomplishments and value as a citizen are 
not measured by his professional skill and ability. He is a popular member 
of social and fraternal circles, and a leader in many of the social functions 
and entertainments. He takes an active part in practical politics, especially 
those of his town and county, and in many ways has served his fellow citizens 
and his fellow partisans. He is also a talented musician. He is highly deserv- 
ing of honor for his true manhood and many-sided and upright character. 
While giving a due share of his energies and enthusiasm to the life work 
whereby he intends to prove his greatest usefulness in the world and pro\-ide 
for his own material needs, he has also recognized the nuiltifarious interests 
which engage human society on every hand and which likev.ise lay claim 
to man's endeavor, and thus has arrived at the happy mean in which he can 
best serve himself and his fellow men. 

Dr. Sharrer was born in Bowen, Illinois, June ii, 1873, ''"'1 ^'^^'^Y '^^ 
said to have inherited the profession of medicine from his father. He is a 
grandson of an early Illinois pioneer, who was born in Pennsylvania and. 
Avas a general merchant in Bowen, Illinois, where he died at the age of sixty 
years ; his wife died at the age of seventy-nine years, and they were the parents 
of three daughters and two sons. 

Dr. Wilbur F. Sharrer, the father of Dr. Sharrer, was born in Juniata 
county, Pennsylvania. He was living in that state at the time of the Civil 
war, and during that conflict served in both the cavalry and infantry arms 
of the military, being in the Twenty-second and Seventy-seventh Pennsylvania 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. . 547 

regiments. He was twice wounded, and entered as a private and was pro- 
moted through the different grades to Heutenant. Right after tlie war he 
moved to Bowen, Ihinois, and taught school, and also studied medicine in 
the Keokuk (Iowa) Medical College. He began practice in Bowen, and in 
the spring of 1874 came to Indiana and located at Rocktield, where he re- 
mained until 188 1, when he moved to Delphi, where he has practiced ever 
since. He has been on the pension examining board for about twenty years. 
He and his wife are Presbyterians, and are both of Scotch-Irish stock. He 
married Catharine E. Moore, a native of Juniata county, Pennsylvania, and 
one oi the two sons and three daughters of a native farmer of Juniata county, 
who died when about sixty-six years old. Five children were iKjrn to \\'illHU' 
F. and Catharine Sharrer, two sons and three daughters, and the two now 
living are Ella B. and Dr. Sharrer. 

Harry E. Sharrer was reared in Rockfield and Delijhi. Indiana, and 
attended the pulilic schools of tliose places. In 1888 he entered Purdue Uni- 
versity, and was graduated from the School of Pharmacy in 1891. For 
a time he held the position of manager and chemist of the Hoyt Chemical 
Company at Terre Haute, but in the same year entered the drug business 
at Delphi in partnership with M. M. Murphy, which they carried on for 
several years. In 1894 Mr. Sharrer entered the Medical College of Ohio, 
at Cincinnati, and remained until his graduation on .\pril g, 1896. On the 
I2th of the same month he opened his office in Hammond, and has been 
engaged in successful practice exes since. 

April 12, 1898, Dr. Sharrer was married to Miss Lottie M. Weaver, 
of Burr Oak, Michigan, a daughter of Edward M. and Mabel Weaver. One 
daughter was born of this marriage, Anna Kathryn. Mrs. Sharrer died 
November 25, 1901, aged twenty-six years. She was a member of the Pres- 
byterian church. On June 16, 1903, Dr. Sharrer married Miss Katharine 
Tracy, of St. Joseph, Missouri, They are both members of the Presbyterian 
church. 

Dr. Sharrer affiliates with Garfield Lodge No. 569. F. & A. M., and 
was made a Mason in Delphi Lodge No. 516. He also belongs to Ham- 
mond Chapter No. 117, R. A. M., and Hammond Commandeiy No. 41, 
K. T. His further fraternal connections are with Hammond Lodge No. 
210, K. of P., and with the Royal League and the Knights of Khorassan. He 



548 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

is a member and secretary of the Lake County Medical Society, is a member 
of tlie Kankakee Valley Medical Society, the Lidiana State Medical Associa- 
tion and the -American Medical Association, and is also a member of the 
executive committee of the National Association of Pension Examining 
Surgeons. He is president of the Hammond Club and a member of the 
Commercial Club of Hammond. He is a member of the Hammond Saenger- 
liund, a German singing society, and an lionorary member of Barnie G. 
Young's Concert Band of Hammond. 

A stanch Repulilican in politics. Dr. Sharrer has been precinct com- 
mitteeman, and is now a member of the county executive committee; is 
treasurer of the city Republican committee and president of the Hammond 
Young Men's Republican Club. He has been a delegate to the state Repub- 
lican conventions for the past eight years. He also belongs to the Chicago 
Lidiana Club. Lie lives at the corner of Hohman and Doty streets, where 
in 1897. 1898 and 1899 be built three residences, which be still owns. He 
is surgeon for f\ye factories in the city of Hammond and is surgeon for the 
Monon Railroad. 

RODMAN H. WELLS. 

Rodman H. ^^'ells, a prominent resident of Crown Point, is senior 
member of the well known firm of R. LI. Wells and Son. proprietors of the 
large livery, sale and boarding stables at 240 Truman a\'enue in Hammond. 
He is one of the oldest native sons of Crown Point, and has made that his 
home throughout the sixty-five and more years of his life. He has thus 
known the county from its earliest times, has at various periods held impor- 
tant county and other local ofifices, and for a quarter of a century had the 
leading livery establishment of Crown Point. He is a fine type of business 
man and citizen, energetic, progressive and public-spirited, and has lived in 
the enjovment of esteem from his fellow men during all his career in Lake 
county. 

Mr. Wells was born in Crown Point, June 6, 1838, a son of Henry 
and Adaline (Witherell) Wells, natives of Massachusetts. Both his grand- 
fathers were natives of tliat state, and both served in the war of 1812. 
Plenrv Wells followed farming in early life. In 1836 he moved from Michi- 
gan to Indiana, taking up land at Crown Point and following farming in 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 549 

that vicinit_v for the remainder of liis life. He was one of the first sheriffs 
of Lake cotinty, and afterward filled tlie office of county treasurer. ?Ie 
always retained and resided on his farm just south of Crown Point, where 
he died. His wife died ahout 1861. They both attended the Presbyterian 
churcli. There were five children in their family : Susan, widow of Alex- 
ander Clark, of Crown Point : Rodman H. ; Eliza, deceased wife of Samuel 
R. Pratt: Homer \\'.. of Crown Point: and Adaline. deceased, who was the 
wife of John E. Luther. 

^ilr. Rodman H. Wells was reared on the homestead farm at Crown 
Point and attended the public schools of the town. Farming was his vocation 
until some years after the war. In August, 1862, he raised Company A. 
of the Xinety-ninth Indiana Infantry, and enlisted in the company as a 
private, although he was offered the second lieutenancy. He served nearly 
three years, and was compelled to come home on account of ill health. He 
participated throughout the Vicksburg campaign. After the war he worked 
his father's place for several years, and at the same time did considerable 
stock-buying, in one season purchasing eight hvmdred head of milch cows 
for the Western Reserve. On leaving the farm he entered the livery business 
at Crown Point and carried it on most successfullv for twentv-five years. In 
1899 he sold out his establishment at the county seat and in partnership with 
his son. Rodman B.. opened the large stables at Hammond. Their outfits 
have a uniformly excellent reputation throughout the city and county, and 
their patronage has been built up to large and profitable proportions. 

Mr. Wells is an influential Republican, and has always taken an active 
part in public affairs. Before the war he was deputy sheriff, and after the 
Rebellion was deputy sheriff under Sheriff Marble for four years. In 1882 
he was elected sheriff and served in that office for two terms, or four 
years. He has also served as chairman of the county central committee and 
a number of times as precinct committeeman, and has been sent as delegate 
to a number of state conventions. Mrs. A\'ells is a member of the Baptist 
church. 

In i860 Mr. Wells married Miss Xancy J. Van Houten. a daughter of 
James and Sallie Ann \"an Houten. ^Irs. Wells died in 187 1. leaving no 
children. In 1872 Mr. \\'ells married Miss Emily W. Van Houten, a sister 
of his first wife. Thev have two children. Tennie il. and Rodman B., the 



550 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

latter being unmarried and in partnersliip with his lather. Jennie M. married 
Herman J. Leliman, and tliey Hve at Crown Point and have two children. 
Hermina and Rodman J. 

BENJAMIN F. HAYES. 

Benjamin l\ Hayes, of 206 Hohman street, Hammond, has been con- 
nected with business and public affairs in Lake county for a numkier of years, 
and is a man of recognized ability and sterling integrity, with an excellent 
record of successful effort since taking up the active duties of life. 

He was born at Muscatine, Iowa, April 4, 1859, a son of Maurice and 
Julia (Guinea) Hayes, natives of Ireland. His great-grandfather lived to 
be nearly a hundred years old, and his grandfather also died when well ad- 
vanced in years. The latter came to America and settled in Connecticut. 
Maurice Hayes learned the tailor's trade, and from Connecticut moved, about 
1856, to Muscatine, Iowa, where he died, when still a young man, in i860. 
His wife survived him until 1872, when she w-as thirtj'-eight years old, and 
by her second husband, Philip Myers, she had three children. The family 
were all Catholics in religious faith. Maurice and Julia Hayes had two sons 
and two daughters : John, of Sulphur Springs, Ohio ; Ella, wife of Edward 
Rader, of Rapid City, Michigan: Beulah, wife of William J. Wallace, of 
Chicago Heights, Illinois; and Benjamin F., of Hammond. 

When Mr. B. F. Hayes was three years old his mother moved to Chi- 
cago, and he remained there and received his education until after the great 
fire of 1871. He then went to Crown Point, Indiana, and attended the 
public schools for a year or so, and that was his principal home for twenty- 
five years. He learned the butcher's trade and followed it for some years. In 
1894 he was elected sheriff of Lake county, being re-elected in 1896, and 
gave a most efficient administration of that office for four years. Since then 
his health has been rather poor, and he has traveled a good deal, and in busi- 
ness his attention has been confined mainly to real estate dealings, he having 
transacted a number of important transfers in this county. He took up 
his residence in Hammond in the spring of 1903. He owns property here 
and also near Crown Point. 

Mr. Hayes affiliates with the Knights of Pythias and the Benevolent 
and Protective Order of Elks. His wife is a member of the Methodist 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 651 

church. He is a Republican in politics, and has served in the township 
council, as road supervisor and constable, and for two terms was marshal 
of Crown Point. 

On Christmas day of 1877 he married Miss Xettie L. Maxwell, a 
daughter of William and Roxanna (Jarvis) Maxwell. Her father was a 
native of Ireland and her mother of New York. There were eight children 
in the famih', two sons and six daughters, and six are now living: Carrie 
Adell, the deceased wife of Samuel R. Smith; Nettie L., Mrs. Hayes; Emma 
F., wife of William Birkley. of Crown Point : Douglas, of Deep River, Lake 
county; Edith M.: Lewis E., of this county; Georgia B., wife of Lafay 
\\'ilkie, of Buffalo, New A'ork ; and Jennie, deceased. Mrs. Hayes" father, 
was a farmer, coming from Irelanrl and settling at Westville, New York, 
when a young man, thence came west and lived in Wisconsin eight years, 
moved from there to Illinois, and in 1865 to Indiana. He died in 1876, aged 
forty-eight years. His father, also William, died in Lake county well ad- 
vanced in years, having been the father of a good-sized family. The maternal 
grandfather of Mrs. Hayes was Alexander Jar\'is, a nati\'e of Ireland, whence 
he came to the United States about 1834 and located at West\-ille, New 
York. He was a farmer. His wife was Margaret Henry, and they had 
eleven children. His father, Joseph Jarvis, died in Ireland. 

WILLIAM C. SMITH. 

William C. Smith, superintendent of the city schools of East Chicago, 
has been engaged in educational work during most of his active career, and 
is a man of exceptional fitness for his calling and of recognized ability in 
both the instructional and administrative fields of his profession. During the 
past three years he has done excellent work in raising the standard and creat- 
ing an educational efficiency in the school system of East Chicago, and is 
held in high esteem among all the patrons of the public schools. 

Mr. Smith was born in New York city, February 2, 1869, a son of 
John G. and Sarah E. (Chandler) Smith, both natives of Massachusetts. He 
is of one of the oldest American families, dating back for seven genera- 
tions. His paternal grandfather, Jcihn G. .Smith, was shoemaker of Beverly, 
Massachusetts, where he died at the age of sixty-five. His wife was Hannah 
Cross, and they had a large family. The maternal grandfather of Superin- 



652 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tendent Smith was Holbrook Chandler, a native of Massachusetts and also 
of an old American family. He was custodian of buildings of the Phillips 
Acadamy at Andover. He attained the advanced age of eighty-seven years. 
By his wife Frances Kimliall he had a good-sized family. John G. Smith, 
the father of William C, was a traveling salesman for thirty-five years. In 
1879 he left New York and located at St. Louis, Missouri, where he made 
his home till his death, in i8g6, at the age of fifty-seven years. His wife 
is still living. They both had membership in the Second Baptist church of 
St. Louis. He had been a soldier during the Civil war, serving in the Thirty- 
fifth Massachusetts Infantry, of the Ninth Army Corps. He was wounded 
at the battle of Antietam, and was at the siege of Knox\'ille and in many 
battles under Sherman. He served as a private for two and a half years. 
He and his wife were parents of four children: Everett H., of St. Louis; 
William C. ; Miss Mattie, of Godfrey. Illinois; and Hannah, of Lincoln, 
Illinois. 

Mr. William C. Smith received his first schooling in Jersey City, and 
after the family moved to St. Louis he attended the public schools of that 
city, and later was a student in the manual training school of Washington 
Lhiiversity, in St. Louis. After school days -were over he was employed 
in various ways in St. Louis until 1887, when he began his career as teacher, 
having charge of district schools for three years. He then became assistant 
principal at Albion, Illinois. In 1901 he came to East Chicago to assume 
the position of superintendent of the city schools, and has served in that 
capacity ever since. 

Superintendent Smith is a member of the Second Baptist church of East 
Chicago, while his wife is an Episcopalian. Politically he is a Republican. 
He resides at 4136 Magoun avenue, where he built his good home in 1902. 
On September 2, 1891, Mr. Smith married Miss Mary Bowman, a daugh- 
ter of Kemp and Sarah (Tribe) Bowman. They have one daughter, Sarah 
Frances. 

AARON NORTON HART. 

.'\aron Norton Hart is a figure of the past, whose career came to a close 

over two decades ago, but whose acts survive as an enduring monument of 

human energy. Count that man well starred, indeed, who accomplishes 

aught in this hurrying world that is destined to continuance and en- 




-^'^cujii^ (yi (^cud- 




^.^Ca^u-tyv^ L^r Mn /hC^ 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 553 

durance, for most men's deeds seldom outlive their mortal years. But 
A. N. Hart (always called A. X. Hart) was a character of such force and 
originality that it was inevitable he should leave an impress on some phase of 
human endeavor, and this will be found in what he did for the advancement of 
agriculture, and reclamation of the swamps of Lake county to lasting cultiva- 
tion and crop-production. He was one of the pioneers and most successful 
promoters of this work, and as his task at the start was a stupendous one. so the 
happy solution of its ditiiculties brought him proportionate rewards, and at 
his death he was one of the wealthy men of Lake county. And rich not alone 
in this world's goods, but in the esteem of his fellow citizens and in his own 
worth as a spirit of action, of energizing power, of virile manhood and no- 
bility of character. 

Mr. Hart was well on toward seventy years of age when he was sud- 
denly deprived of life, but he was an active force in affairs and at the moment 
of his death was employed in the work which will stand as his most important 
enterprise. He met his death on January 12, 1883, under the following cir- 
cumstances as related by the local press : 

"Fridav morning about 11 130 o'clock Mr. Hart was superintending the 
construction of a ditch cutting off a large bend in Plum creek, which flows 
through his farm at Dyer. The ditch had already been cut through, and a 
current was flowing. The bottom of the ditch was about two feet wide, and 
the banks some ten or twelve feet high. A man was working just ahead of 
him, cutting off clods and frozen earth, while ]Mr. Hart was standing at the 
bottom of the ditch, pulling the loosened clods down into the ditch that they 
might float off. Suddenly, without warning, the left-hand bank caved, the 
sharp, frozen edge of the falling bank striking him in the region of the heart. 
Death was instantaneous. He was .thrown against the opposite bank and 
buried to the waist. The man nearest him states that Mr.' Hart did not utter 
a word, and simply threw up one hand: but whether it was an involuntary 
motion or a gesture, he cannot tell. It required the exertions of ten men to 
extricate the body, which was at once taken to the residence of the famih/ 
near by. It is supposed that the bank had become loosened by the blasting, 
which had been previously done to open the ditch, and that it was ready to 
fall at the slightest touch." Funeral services were held at his late residence 
at Dver and also at Crown Point, where the remains were interred. 



554 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

This once so well-known figure in real estate and commercial circles 
was born at Akron, Ohio, April i6, 1816, being a son of Wilham J. and Flora 
(Norton) Hart, of New England. His grandfather was a sea captain of 
Nova Scotia, and William J. Hart's early home before coming west was in 
Connecticut. 

Mr. Hart was well educated in the schools of Ohio, and throughout life 
was noted for his strong intelligence and keen, alert mind. In the fall of 
1850 he went to Philadelphia, where he soon became engaged in the book 
publishing business, under the firm name of Rice & Hart, Book Publishers. 
This firm published such works as "National Portrait Gallery," "American 
Sylva," and "North American Indians," and shortly after the issue of the first 
named IMr. Hart came west to the territory about Chicago and engaged in 
selling the work. On July 4, 1861, he located permanently at Dyer in this 
county, where he had previously made extensive investments in land. After- 
wards he engaged in the real estate business in Chicago, where the firm of 
Hart & Biggs continued for some years before the fire. 

Mr. Hart was one of the large land-owners in Lake county, and it is in 
connection with his real estate interests that the forceful elements of his life 
are best manifested. He owned eight thousand acres in one body in St. John 
township, and at the time of his death possessed altogether seventeen thousand 
acres in the county. The Hartsdale farm of eight thousand acres was one 
of the first of the fertile and inestimably valuable tracts to be rescued from 
the dominion of swamp and fen, which had been its state for centuries. It 
was about 1857. when he was traveling through this state and Illinois in 
the interests of his publications, that Mr. Hart saw the immense Cady's 
marsh, then covered by water, and realized at once that it could be drained. 
He Ixjught several thousand acres at various prices ranging from seA'enty- 
five cents to a dollar and a quarter per acre. He e.xecuted an ingenious and 
thorough system of drainage by which the water was drawn off into the 
Calumet river, and ]\Ir. Hart found that he had thousands of acres of rich 
alhuial soil, whose depth of fertility could never be impoverished by cultiva- 
tion, and where crops have grown through all the successive years in abund- 
ance and ever increasing value. A few months before his death Mr. Hart was 
offered two hundred thousand dollars for his farm, but refused, since it was 
worth twice that princely sum. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 555 

Mr. Hart was energetic and enterprising in many affairs looking^ to per- 
manent improvement and development of his county, and no feasible plan for 
public progress could be presented to him without arousing his interest and 
co-operation. His pioneer efforts in making the fertile farming tracts from 
the original swamps did more for the permanent growth and prosperity of 
the town of D}'er than any other one cause, and that town and community 
lost a great force for good in the death of Mr. Hart. He was very much 
interested in a ship canal from the .southern end of Lake Michigan to Toledo, 
effecting the saving of the long passage to the north through the straits of 
Mackinac. He was not a dreamer, but a practical man of affairs, and the 
solution of hard problems and the undertaking of great enterprises were the 
natural element for his mind and energies to work in. 

Mr. Hart was married at Philadelphia in 1844 to Miss Martha Reed 
Dyre. who was born in New Bedford, Massachusetts, in 1824, and died at 
Crown Point, Januar}- 4, 1897, a companionable and much loved old lady of 
seventy-three years. She was the niece of Father Taylor, the famous Boston 
divine. A. N. Hart and wife had the following children: James \\'.. de- 
ceased: ^Milton R. : Malcolm T., deceased; and Mrs. Flora Norton Biggs. 
Mr. Hart was an uncompromising Republican after that party came into exist- 
ence, and before that his political alignment had been with the Whig element. 

Mrs. Flora Norton Biggs, the only daughter of Mr. Hart, was born in 
.\kron, Ohio, and was educated in Mrs. Cary's private school in Philadelphia. 
She was united in marriage in 1863 to Mr. James H. Biggs, of Cincinnati, 
now deceased, and who for some time was engaged in the real estate business. 

LOUIS BARKER. 

Louis Barker, proprietor of the leading clothing and men's furnishing 
goods store in Indiana Harbor, will, as a matter of record for all present 
and future history, have the distinction of being the pioneer merchant of 
this town, the one who recognized an opportunity and opened a place of 
business before ever the present work of exploitation and development of 
the townsite had been begun. His fortunate selection of a location and his 
fine liusiness ability and reliable methods of dealing have all combiiied to 
give him a prosperous trade and an influential position among the men of 
affairs in whose keeping lies the greatness of Indiana Harbor. 



556 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Barker was born in Russian Poland. December 25. 1830. being a. 
son of Herman and Goldie (Barnett) Barker. His family name was orig- 
inally Barkavvfski, but for business reasons he had it changed after coming 
to the United States. His paternal grandfather was Jacob Barkawfski, 
who was a native of Poland and was engaged in buying horses for the gov- 
ernment. He had a small family, and he lived to be eighty years of age. 
Mr. Barker's maternal grandparents were Samuel and Sarah Barnett. both 
natives of Russia, where the former was a grain dealer and died at the age 
of eighty-five. Herman Barker, the father of Mr. Barker, was a fruit dealer, 
and in 1865 emigrated to America. Sickness soon caused him to return to 
the old country, where he died in 1869, aged sixty-nine years. His wife 
died in 1890, when about seventy-eight years old. They were both of the 
Hebrew faith. There were eight cliildren born to them, three sons and five 
daughters, and the six now living are Simon, Louis. Meier. Pearl, Sarah 
and Rebecca. 

Mr. Louis Barker received his school advantages in his native land. He 
came to America with his father in 1865. and after living in New York city 
two years came west to Chicago, where for a number of years he was in 
Ih the grocery business. In November, 1901, he came out to Indiana Harlior 

and built a small store building as the first business enterprise of a coming 
town. He transacted a general merchandise business for some time, and 
a year later his family moved to the place. In the summer of 1903, after 
the full tide of prosperity and industrial development had struck the place, 
he put up a fine brick store and residence, and he also owns other real estate 
in the city, besides a building in East Chicago. His son Harry was the second 
person to open a business establishment here, a restaurant, and he later 
organized the Indiana Harbor Yacht Club. Mr. Barker is a Republican in 
politics, and the family remain true to the religious faith of their ancestors. 

June 26, 1869, Mr. Barker married Miss Rebecca Moses, a daughter 
of Max and Lillie Moses. Eight children were born of their marriage. a=; 
follows : Annie, who married Mr. A. Frank, of Chicago, and they ha\-e two 
sons. Beniamin and Lester; Isaac; Fannie, who married I. Bergson, of Chi- 
cago, and has two daughters, Dorothy and Sadie Belle; Harry; Heiman. who 
married Belle Cohn and lives in Indiana Harlior. and has one son. Earl; 
S.Tnuiel ; Da^■id ; and Sadie. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 557 

WILLIAAl H. HERSHMAN. 

\A'illiani H. Hershnian, .superintendent of the city schools of Hammond, 
is a well known educator of Lake county and the state of Indiana, and during 
the past three years has made a splendid record through his connection with 
the public schools of Hammond. He has devoted the best years of his life 
to his profession, and from first to last has been in the front rank of educa- 
tional progress. The field has been vastly broadened, standards of efficiency 
have been raised and ideals have changed since he taught his first school, but 
to-day as well as twenty years ago Professor Hershnian is a dominant and 
influential spirit both as a school manager and an instructor of the young. 

He was born in White county. Indiana, Jnly 20, 1851, being a son of 
Jacob and Mary (Edmondson) Hershman, natives of Ohio and Tennessee 
respectively. In the paternal line he is of German descent, and his grand- 
father came from Virginia to Ohio in an early day, and thence became a 
pioneer of Hamilton county, Indiana, at a time when that portion of the 
state was the haunt of wild animals and Indians. Many of his descendants 
still live in Hamilton county. He was a farmer, and lived to be eighty-five 
years of age. His wife w'as Mary Cartmill, and she was about the same 
age at the time of her death. They had a large family, eight sons and 
several daughters, but all are now deceased but two daughters, Mrs. Sarah 
Smith, a widow, of Lafayette, Indiana, and Mrs. Mary Strong-, in Nebraska. 

lacob Hershman, the father of Professor Hershman. also followed 
farming. He came to Indiana when fifteen years old, and resided in Hamil- 
ton county till after his marriage, when he moved to Benton county and 
later to White county, and in 186S to Newton county, where he lived until 
his death, in Brook in March, 1903, when about eighty-two years old. He 
was one of the stanchest supix)rters by faith and works of the Methodist 
church, as is his widow, who is now seventy-nine years of age. Her father 
was Thomas Edmondson, who was born in Ireland and came to this country 
and settled near Knoxville, Tennessee, where he followed his trade of mill- 
wright. He died in young manhood, but his wife, whose name was Nancy 
Box, lived to the age of si.xty-three years, having been the mother of seven 
children, all of the sons Init one becoming preachers. Jacob and Mary Hersh- 
man were the parents of seven children, five of whom are now living: George 
died while a soldier in the Civil war; Jolm R. lives in Brook, Indiana; W^illiam 



558 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

H., of Hammond; Jennie is the wife of Xewton Lyons, of Jasper county, 
Indiana; Frank is deceased; Sarali and Linnie are twins, the former the wife 
of James Hoach, of Chicago Heights, Ilhnois, and tlie latter the wife of 
Thomas Gratner, of the same place. 

Mr. William H. Hershman lived in White county, Indiana, until he was 
seventeen, spending his youth on a farm. From the district schools he went 
to the National Normal School at Lebanni3n. Ohio, and later to the Indiana 
State University, at Bloomington, where he was graduated with the degree 
of A. B. in 1898. He then took a course in the University of Chicago and 
in the Cook County Normal School. These periods of higher training were 
interspersed in longer periods of teaching, and except when in college he has 
been teaching practically ever since he was eighteen years old. His first 
school was in Newton county. He was president of the \'incennes University 
one year. He came to Hammond on October i. 1901. and has held the posi- 
tion of superintendent ever since. There are eight school buildings under 
his supervision, and the enrollment of pupils is about 2.670. The snperin- 
tendency is a responsible and arduous incumbency, but he has given eminent 
satisfaction and done a fine work for the cause of public education in this 
city. Mr. Hershman served as county superintendent of schools of Newton 
county for ten years, being elected five successive times with unanimous 
consent except the first time. He has also concerned himself to some extent 
with newspaper work, and is one of the proprietors of the Brook Reporter. 

Mr. Hershman in politics is independent. He and his wife are mem- 
bers of the Methodist church, and he is one of the church stewards. He af- 
filiates with Garfield Lodge No. 596, F. & A. M.. with Hammond Chapter, 
R. A. M., and with Hammond Commandery No. 41, K. T., and also with 
Murat Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Indianapolis; with Delphi Lodge No. 
28 and with Carroll Encampment No. 17, I. O. O. F., and with the Patriarchs 
Militant at New Albany, Indiana. He resides and owns a nice home at 39 
Webb street. 

July 3, 1873, Mr. Hershman married Miss Jennie Lyons, a daughter of 
Samuel and Margaret (Smith) Lyons. They have two children. Ara Ethel 
is a teacher in the Hammond public schools, and George is attending Armour 
Institute of Technolog)-. 

Mrs. Hershman's father was a native of Virginia and her mother of 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 559 

Xew Jersey, and she was the only daughter of five children. Her father, a 
son of IMorris Lyons, also a native of Virginia, was a blacksmith in early 
life, later a farmer, and now lives with his daughter at the great age of 
ninety years. His wife died in August, 1903, aged seventy-eight years. Her 
father was named Joseph Smith, and he was truly a hardy and venerable old 
pioneer. He lacked only two months of being ninety-eight years old at the 
time of his death. He hel]>ed build the breastworks aroimd New York dur- 
ing the war of 1812. His birthplace was Hoboken. New Jersey. lie was one 
of the first settlers of Jasper county, Lidiana, and was one of the first county 
commissioners of Jasper and Newton counties, serving for several terms. He 
left Indiana and went to Kansas in the fifties, where he took part in the 
border warfare of that state. He died at Brook, Indiana. He had been left 
an orphan, and been bound out as apprentice to a tanner, and his long life 
was filled with honorable and useful effort. 

JOHN A. GAVIT. 

John A. Gavit, attorney at law in the ^lajestic building at Hammond, 
has carried on a successful practice in this city since 1896, and has 
been practicing at the l:-ar for the past sixteen years. Before coming to 
Hammond he took considerable part in public affairs, and he still gives pub- 
lic-spirited interest to all matters affecting the general welfare of his com- 
munity. He is an able lawyer, well read and a fluent talker, and is a genial 
and talented gentleman who wields a good influence in the city and county. 

Air. Gavit was born in \\'alsingham, Canada, August 19, 1861, a son of 
Albert N. and Bridget (Highland) Gavit, the former a native of Connecticut 
and the latter of Ireland. His paternal grandfather, Albert Gavit, was a 
native Connecticut farmer, but who died in Canada in old age, having reared 
a large family. His maternal grandfather, Patrick Highland, was born in 
Ireland and followed farming during his earlier years. He emigrated to 
Canada, and after some years moved to Pontiac, Michigan, where he died 
in old age. By his wife Hannah he had a number of children. Albert N. 
Gavit has always followed farming, and is still living on his farmstead near 
Saginaw, Michigan. He has been honored with various township oflices. 
He and his wife had seven children : John A. : Frank M.. of Whiting, In- 
diana; Louis N., of Saginaw, Michigan: Mary, wife of Frank Cole, of 
Saginaw; William, of Saginaw; the other two children are deceased. 



560 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

y\r. John A. Ga^it spent his boyhood days near Pontiac. Michigan. He 
attended the pubhc schools there, and in 1886 graduated from tlie Normal 
College at Flint, Michigan. He then read law, and was admitted to the bar 
in 1888. He was engaged in practice at Saginaw from then until 1896, at 
which date he came to Hammond, where he has created a good reputation in 
his profession and built up a very fine clientage. Mr. Gavit is a Democrat 
in politics, and at Saginaw was justice of tlie peace for three years. He re- 
signed that office to accept the nomination for prosecuting attorney, and was 
elected and served in that office for two years. 

Mr. Gavit affiliates with the Knight of Pythias, the Maccabees and the 
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. He resides at 755 Sibley street, 
where he bought ground and erected a good home. In January-, 1890, he 
married Miss Emma Campbell, the daughter of John and Adelia (Johnson) 
Campbell. They have six children : Elwin J., Russell, Bernard, Donald. 
Hubert and Inez. 

MELVIN A. HALSTED. 

Melvin A. Halsted, who is living a retired life in Lowell, was born in 
Rensselaer county, New York. March 29, 1821. The ancestry of the fam.ily 
can be traced back to William the Conqueror, and three brothers of the name 
came to America in early colonial days, settling in New York. The great- 
grandfather of Melvin A. Halsted was a mmister of the Baptist church and 
was one of a party of six that owned an entire township in Rensselaer countv. 
New York. One representative of the family, Thomas Halsted, remained 
loyal to the British crown, but Joseph Halsted, the grandfather of our sub- 
ject, espoused the cause of the colonists and valiantly did battle for their 
rights. He was born in the Empire state on the bank of the Hudson river, 
became a farmer and followed that occupation throughout his entire life. 
William Halsted, the father of ]\Ielvin A., was also a native of Rensselaer 
county, New York, and after arriving at years of maturity he was united in 
marriage to Miss Patty Haskin, who was born in Pittstown, New York, and 
was a descendant of Enoch Haskin, who was of Scotch birth, coming from the 
land of the heather to America in the year 1700. Mr. and Mrs. William 
Halsted were the parents of two sons, Init tlie younger, Edson, is now de- 
ceased. 

The only sur\-iving member of the family is Melvin A. Halsted, who 




MRS. M. A. HALSTED 




JC^Mt^aAHcC 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 561 

was reared in the place of his nativity until fourteen years of age and attended 
the public schools there. He was also a student in the high school at Benning- 
ton, Vermont, and in 1837 he removed to Montgomery county, Ohio, locating 
in Dayton. He was there married in May, 1842, to Miss Martha C. Foster, 
and for three years they continued their residence in Dayton, at the end of 
which time the}- came to Lake county, Indiana, locating in West Creek 
township, where IMr. Halsted carried on farming until 1848. He then came 
to what is now the town of Lowell and built and operated a sawmill. The 
following year he burned four hundred thousand brick, and erected the house 
in which he still lives. It is yet a stibstantial structure and is a monument to 
his life of thrift and energy. Attracted by the discovery of gold in California, 
l\ir. Halsted crossed the plains in 1S50, accomplishing a part of the journey 
with ox teams and the remainder of the trip with mule teams. He was one 
hundred days upon the way, and after spending about a year on the Pacific 
coast he returned to the Mississippi valley by way of Salt Lake city, being 
eighty days upon the return trip. In 1852 he built the flour mill at Lowell, 
hauling all of the machinery from Chicago in wagons. In 1853 he began the 
operation of this mill, and it became one of the important industries of this 
part of the state, receiving a patronage from a large district. Alx)ut 1857, 
however, he sold the property and removed to southern Illinois, but in the 
meantime he had entered the land upon which the town of Lowell now stands. 
In southern Illinois he built and operated a grist and saw mill at Kinmundy, 
twenty miles north of Centralia, on the Chicago branch of the Illinois Cen- 
tral Railroad. There he remained until 1859, when he sold his property and 
again went to California, where he built another flouring mill thirty miles 
south of San Francisco. In 1861 he sold this for twelve thousand dollars, 
and then returned to Kinmundy, Illinois, where he owned real estate. After 
four months, however, he again went to California, by way of New York 
and the isthmus route, arriving eventually at San Francisco. He then made 
his way to Virginia City and was engaged in mining at Gold Hill for about 
three years, when he returned by way of Panama and New York to Lowell, 
Indiana. His family had joined him at Gold Hill in 1862, and in 1863 he made 
a trip among the giant trees of the state. At Gold Hill he built four houses, 
which he rented, and thus he contributed to the improvement and development 
of the town. On the 4th of January, 1864, he started for Indiana by the 



562 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

water route, leaving his family, liowever. in California. On reaching Lake 
county he found that his original property at Lowell was for sale, and ]jur- 
chased it, together with other property, including a flour mill three miles 
from Lowell, in addition to the one at Lowell. On his return to Lowell he 
put the mills in excellent condition and carried on the business of manufactur- 
ing flour for some time. He then sent word for his wife to sell his property 
in California and Nevada and join him in Lowell. He met his family at 
New York city and went to Washington, where they \isited Mount \'ernon 
and many places of interest in and about the city. While there ]\Ir. Halsted 
obtained the assistance of Mr. Colfax in getting the first daily mail for Lowell. 

Mr. Halsted continued in the milling business at Lowell until 1869, when 
lie sold out and spent the succeeding winter in San Francisco, again making 
the trip to the Pacific coast by water. He erected fourteen houses for renting 
purposes at Valejo, California, twenty-two miles from San Francisco, and 
continued to own that property until 1872, when he sold out to one of the 
owners of the Northern Pacific Railroad Company. In tliat year his family 
returned to Indiana, while Mr. Halsted made a hunting tour off the Island of 
St. Barbara. He captured four sea lions on the expedition, which he sold to 
John Robinson, the showman, for twelve hundred dollars. Later Mr. Halsted 
visited Kinmundy. Illinois, before returning to Lowell. He has also visited 
New England, viewing many points of historic interest in that country, 
including Plymouth Rock, on which the early settlers first stepped as they 
landed from the Mayflower on American soil. Going to Utah territory, he 
sent for his family to join him there, and became superintendent of a mine, 
which he conducted until the demonetization of silver in 1873, After his 
return from Utah he was instrumental in securing the building of the Monon 
Railroad through Lake county. He did grading to the value of eighty-five 
thousand dollars, but only received sixty-five thousand dollars, thus suffering 
a loss of twenty thousand dollars. He is now engaged in the real estate busi- 
iies in Lowell. 

Mr. and Mrs. Halsted have two sons, William M., who is a resident of 
Topeka, Kansas, and Theron H., who is residing in Lowell. Mr. Halsted 
gave his early political support to the Whig party, and heard William Henry 
Harrison deliver a political speech on the lOth of September, 1840. On the 
dissolution of that party he joined the ranks of the new Republican party, of 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. . 563 

which he has since been a stalwart advocate. He is now the oldest Mason of 
Lowell and a charter member of the lodge in this place. He has passed the 
eighty-third milestone on life's journey, and his has been a very eventful 
career, in which he has largely witnessed the growth and upbuilding of the 
country and has taken an active and helpful part in the work of progress in 
many sections of the United States. From actual experience he has intimate 
knowledge concerning the history of pioneer days in California as well as in 
Lidiana and Illinois, and his life record, if written in detail, would present 
many chapters of intense and thrilling interest. He is very widely known in 
northwestern Indiana, and his worth as a man and citizen is widely ackn<.iwl- 
edged. 

BEXJAMIX F. IBACH. 

Benjamin F. Ibach, lawyer of Hammond, with offices in the Hammond 
building, has been prominent in practice at the bar of Indiana for the past 
forty years. He has gained an enviable reputation as pleader and counsel, 
but huS also gone afield into politics and public life, and one of the most im- 
portant state charitable institutions owes its organization and high efficiency 
to his sincere and intelligent efforts. Before entering the law he bad made a 
great success in the teaching profession, and he performed noteworthy service 
in this line in both Pennsylvania and Indiana. Mr. Ibach is a man of broad 
practical and scholastic attainments, devoted to bis main work in life and 
al.io interested in world and community affairs, and has the humanly sympa- 
thetic instincts which are the marks of the well rounded and large character. 

Mr. Ibach was born in Cherrington. Lebanon county. Pennsylvania. 
January 31, 1834, so that he has now passed the limit of life set by the 
Psalmist, but is still able to perform a useful part in life for some years to 
come. He is a son of Charles and Elizabeth (Hine) Ibach, and is the only 
one living of the three sons and two daughters born to those parents. His 
father was torn at Reimscheid, near Diisseldorf, Germany, and was a manu- 
facturer of iron kitchen utensils, as was also his father. He was brought 
to America in 1799, when six years old, the family locating in Chester 
county, Pennsylvania, and there he was reared and in that state lived the 
rest of his life. He died in Cherrington, Pennsylvania, in August, 1833, 
before his son Benjamin was born. He and his wife were both Lutherans 
in faith. His wife was born in Berks county, Pennsylvania, and survived 



564 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

him until 1881, being then eighty-two years old. Her father, J(ihn Hine, was 
a life-long resident of Pennsylvania, dying at Philadelphia when nearly sev- 
enty years old. He was a fanner until he retired late in life to Philadelphia. 

Mr. Benjamin F. Ibach was reared on a farm in Pennsylvania. He at- 
tended one of the first public schools established in the state. At the age of 
sixteen he was apprenticed to Emanuel Schaefifer, of Lancaster, Pennsyl- 
vania, and learned the saddle, harness, collar and trunk-making business. 
After completing his apprenticeship he worked at his trade long enough to 
earn money with which to attend the Strasburg Academy. After a term 
or so in that institution he taught in the public schools of Lancaster county, 
and then became principal of the Strasburg Academy, which position he 
held for several years, ^^l^ile principal he and James P. Wickersham and 
anotb.er gentleman were appointed a committee at a teachers" county conven- 
tioi; to organize a normal school. They organized and set going such a 
school at Millersville, with ]\Ir. \\'ickersham as president, and out of this 
institution grew the State Normal School at Millersburg. After leaving the 
Strasburg Academy Mr. Ibach for several years was superintendent of the 
public schools of Columbia, Pennsylvania, and in 1862 became superinten- 
dent of tiie public schools of Huntington, Indiana. 

While engaged in school work both in Pennsylvania and in Huntington 
Mr. Ibach was reading law, one of his preceptors being W. T. Phail, of Lan- 
caster, Pennsylvania, and in November. 1864, he was admitted to the bar 
at Huntington. He began practice in that city at once. He was elected 
prosecuting attorney for several terms, and was also judge of the common 
pleas court for a time. He held the office of city attorney of Huntington 
for seventeen vears. As a matter of recreation principally he had devoted 
some study to feeble-minded children, and when the legislature passed an 
act for the organization of a school to care for such children. Governor Will- 
iams appointed Mr, Ibach as one of the trustees. After the completion of 
a suitable building for the purposes, the governor induced him to resign his 
place as trustee on condition that the board of trustees should elect him super- 
intendent of the institution, which was done. He organized the school, placed 
it on a good business basis, and during his two years' management the asylum 
attracted national attention to its efficiency and was visited by superintendents 
from various states for the purpose of noting its methods of improving this 
class of children. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 565 

After resigning this important work he resumed legal practice at Hunt- 
ington, where he remained until 1895. in which year he came to Hammond, 
and has continued his successful legal career in this city to the present writ- 
ing. In 1886 he was elected to the legislature for the counties of Hunting- 
ton and Allen, being a member of the memorable assembly of 1887, during 
which he voted for David Turpie for United States senator. His political 
allegiance was given to the Democratic party until after Cleveland's first 
election, and from that time until 1896 he was in alignment with the Re- 
publicans. His views as to money caused him to swing with the silver Re- 
publicans, and since then most of his influence has been on the side of Democ- 
racy. He is a member of the Methodist church, and fraternally is affiliated 
with Garfield Lodge No. 569. F. & A. M.. at Hammond. 

January 29, 1856, Mr. Ibach married Miss Kate E. Warfel, whose 
parents died when she was an infant, and she was taken and reared as the 
daughter of B. B. Gonder. Three children were born of this marriage, 
Charles L., Preston G. and Joseph G. Charles L. was a clerk in Indianapolis 
at the time of his death ; his wife was Lizzie Chambers, of Camden, New 
Jersey, who is also now- deceased. Preston G. is a successful physician in 
Hammond; he married Miss Nellie Huntoon. Joseph G. is an attorney in 
Hammond: he married Miss Minnie Friedley. and they have three children, 
Mary, Anna and Joseph. Mrs. Kate Ibach died in February, 1864, when 
twentv-nine vears old. She was a member of the ]\Iethodist church. 

In May, 1876. Mr. Ibach married Miss Martha \\'ilson, a daughter of 
Samuel \\'ilson. She died in October, 1891, at the age of sixty-three, having 
been a faithful member of the Methodist church. There are no children liv- 
ing of that union. On July 22, 1903, Mr. Ibach married for his present wife 
Mrs. Amanda L. Rounds, a widow. 

PATRICK REILLEY. 

Patrick Reilley, at present of the Reilley Plumbing Company of Ham- 
mond, is a man of broad and varied business and industrial experience, cov- 
ering several important fields of human activity and in tlifferent parts of the 
countn-. He has known a life of busy and useful effort since he was a young 
bov. when he joined the na\-al serx'ice of the United States while the Civil 
war was still in progress. While with the navy he saw much of the inhabited 



566 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

part of the globe. He came west to Hammond, aljout twenty years ago, 
to identify himself with the butterine department of the packing company, 
and since then has embarked in the plumbing business, in which he has been 
most successfully employed for a number of years. He is now able to rely 
and place much responsibility on the shoulders of his stalwart sons, and he 
has good reason to be proud of his fine family, which lie has reared to careers 
of usefulness in addition to perfcjrming well his own part in life. He has 
entered much into public affairs since taking up his residence in Hammond, 
has been honored with the office of mayor of the city, and in many ways 
is identified prominently with the life and welfare of his community. 

Mr. Reilley was born in Verplanck's Point, New York, January i. 1848, 
a son of James and Bridget (O'Donnell) Reilley, both natives of Ireland, 
where their parents lived and died. His father followed various pursuits in 
young manhood. He was a brick-maker by trade, and on coming to America 
settled in New York state. He was for some time superintendent of the 
Second Avenue car stables, and in 1855 was killed there by the kick of a 
horse. He and his wife were both Roman Catholics. His wife survived 
him three years, and by her second husband, John Allen, had one son, John 
Allen, Jr. There were six children, two sons and four daughters, born to 
James and Bridget Reilley, but only two are now living: Patrick and 
Bridget, the latter the wife of John Hessick, of Lebanon, Indiana. 

Mr. Patrick Reilley lived in New York state until after the breaking 
out of the Civil war, and recei\ed his early education in that state. On 
October 23, 1863, when fifteen years old, he enlisted at Philadelphia in the 
United States Marine Corps, and served as drummer for five years, three 
months and eight days. He re-enlisted at the close of his service, and went 
to Europe in the United States frigate Guerriere. He served four years 
in all, and was also assigned to other ships, the Don, the De Soto and the 
Brooklyn. After leaving that department of naval work he was employed 
in the Brooklyn navy yard for some time, and later began the manufacture 
of butterine at Charlestown, Massachusetts. He was in the employ of the 
vStandard Butter Manufacturing Company for some time, and later with 
John Reardon and Son of Cambridgeport, Massachusetts. In 1884 he came 
to Hammond to accept the position of superintendent of the Hammond but- 
terine department, remaining with the company for twelve years. He re- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 56T 

signed and went into the pluni1)ing and later into the grocery business with 
his sons James and Edward, confining his attention to that line of mer- 
chandising for three years. For the past six years he has given his principal 
energies to the conduct of the Reilley Plumbing Company, which has a large 
and profitable patronage in this city. 

Mr. Reilley gives his political allegiance to the Democratic party. He 
served as councilman of the third ward for eight years, and for the last 
eighteen months of that time acted as mayor. Two years later he was re- 
elected to the council, and was afterward elected to the office of mayor, which 
he held four years. He and his wife and family are members of the Catho- 
lic church, and he affiliates with the Knights of Columbus, the Catholic 
Order of Foresters, the Independent Order of Foresters of the State of In- 
diana, the Ancient Order of United Workmen and the Benevolent and Pro- 
tective Order of Elks. He has lived at his pleasant home at 283 South 
Hohman street for the past eighteen years. 

Mr. Reilley married Miss Mary A. McSweeney, a daugliter of Edward 
and INIary (Murphy) McSweeney. They are the parents of thirteen chil- 
dren, eight of whom are living, as follows: Marj' Ann. James C, Edward, 
Catherine. Bessie, Xora, Julia and Joseph. James C. married Josie Enright. 

FRED S. CHARTIER. 

Fred S. Chartier. the popular liveryman at Hammond, has been identi- 
fied with the business affairs of this citv for the past five years and has 
gained the esteem and high regard of all his fellow citizens through his fair 
and progressive business methods and his own personal integrity of character. 

He was born in Valparaiso, Indiana, May 24, 1871, being a son of 
Jacob and Emma Chartier, natives of Napierville, Quebec, and born, respec- 
tively, November 2, 1835, and October 19, 1845. The father of Mrs. Emma 
Chartier was a native of Canada, whence he came to the Ignited States and 
was one of the early settlers of St. Ann. Illinois, where he died at the age of 
eightj'-four years, having been the father of a large family. The paternal 
grandfather of Mr. Chartier was of French parentage but a native of Canada, 
and was a farmer by occupation. He died at Valparaiso, Indiana, at the 
advanced age of eighty-one years. There were eight children in his family. 

Jacob Chartier was eighteen years old when he came to the United 



568 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

States in 1853 and located at Valparaiso, Indiana, where he engaged in farm- 
ing for a few years. He then became a brick manufacturer, and continued 
that business up to 1897. since which time he has Hved retired. He served 
as city councilman of Valparaiso for several terms, and has otherwise been 
prominent in business and pul^lic affairs. He and his wife are Catholics 
in faith. They had eleven children, six sons and five daughters, and eight 
are now living: George, of Stony Island, Illinois; Fred S., of Hammond; 
Leonie, of Valparaiso; Eliza, wife of H. B. Blair, of Fort Wayne, Indiana; 
Alfred C, of Hammond; Margaret, wife of Clarence Dillingham, of Val- 
paraiso; Stella, wife of David Lameroux, of Chicago; and Peter, of Val- 
paraiso. 

Mr. Fred S. Chartier was reared at Valparaiso, in which city he at- 
tended both the parochial and the public schools. He undertook life's re- 
sponsibilities at an early age, and has since made his own way and gained 
by self -achievement the prominent position in business affairs that now be- 
longs to him. At the age of fifteen he went to Michigan, where he remained 
for a year, and then went to South Chicago, where he lived for eleven years. 
He followed railroading until 1894, '^"fl ^^'^s then in the o\\ and gasoline 
and bottle-lieer business. In September, 1899, '^^ came to Hammond, and 
for the past two years has been engaged in conducting a first-class livery 
establishment, to v^■hich he has recently added an undertaking business. He 
is a live, wide-awake business man. and understands the art of gaining trade 
and retaining it by fair and honoraljlc dealings. 

Mr. Chartier was married .\pril 10, 1893, to Miss Catherine Young, 
a daughter of Michael J. and Mary (Conway) Young. They have three 
children, Fred Walter, Marie Agnes and Irene .Mice. Mr. and Mrs. Char- 
tier are members of the Catholic church, and he affiliates with the North 
American Union, and with the Independent Order of Foresters of Toronto. 
In politics he is a Democrat. 

OSCAR DINWIDDIE. 

Oscar Dinwiddle, of whom a likeness is here given, is the oldest son of 
the pioneer J. W. Dinwiddle. He is a farmer and large land owner of Plum 
Grove, in Eagle Creek township, is master of Center Grange, has been an 
officer in the State Grange and National Grange of the Patrons of Hus- 




OSCAR DINWIDDIE 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 56!) 

bandry, and is president of the Old Settler and Historical Association of Lake 
connty. He takes an active part in the Farmers' Listitutes and is a member 
of the Lake County Tax Payers' League. He is corresponding secretary of 
the Dinwiddle Clan. 

J. FLOYD IRISH. 

J. Floyd Irish, engaged in the real estate and insurance business at 
Hammond, with office over the First National Bank, has been connected 
with various departments of business activity in Lake county for the past 
twenty years, and has made a commendable record for reliability, integrity 
and ability in all his dealings. He takes much interest in the progress and 
welfare of his city and county, and is a citizen who can be depended upon 
to carry out his obligations in every department of life. 

Mr. Irish was born in Brunswick, Lake county, Indiana. June 19, 1867, 
a son of Josephus Hull and Mary Ellen (Vinnedge) Irish. His paternal 
grandfather. Joab Irish, was a nati\"e of Vermont, a farmer by occupation, 
and died well advanced in years, having been the father of twelve children, 
six sons and six daughters. Josephus H. Irish was born in Chittenden 
county, Vermont, and trained himself for the profession of veterinary sur- 
geon. He came west to Brunswick, Indiana, in 1S50, and lived there until 
1888, when he moved to Hammond, where he died January 20, 1902, at the 
age of seventy-fi\'e years. He held the office of justice of the peace for thirty- 
four years. His wife still survives him, and now resides in Zion City, 
Illinois. He was married three times. His first wife died about a year after 
their marriage, and her child died in infancy. His second wife was Clarissa 
Bidwell, by whom he had four children, three now living, as follows : 
Cornelius E., of Hammond: Martha M., wife of Elliott J. Jarrard, of Ham- 
mond ; and Arvilla, wife of Walter Bowes, of Crown Point, Indiana. His 
third wife was Mary Ellen \'innedge, who was born near Plymouth. Indiana, 
and they were the parents of six children : Ida May : deceased, who was the 
wife of Adolphus E. Crowell ; Clara A., the deceased wife of Ernest \\^ Sohl ; 
Iva E., deceased, who also was the wife of Ernest W. Sohl ; George Edward, 
deceased ; J. Floyd Irish, of Hammond ; and Charles Hull Irish, of Zion City, 
Illinois, assistant cashier in a bank. 

Mr. J. Floyd Irish was born and reared and has lived all his life in Lake 
county. He attended the public schools at Brunswick and Crown Point, after 



570 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

which he engaged in teaching school for six terms. He clerked in a furni- 
ture and undertaking establishment in Crown Point for some time, and in 
1888 came to Hammond. He taught school and later clerked in a con- 
fectionery store, after which he returned to Crown Point, and was in the 
employ of Peter Geisen for two years. He went back to Hammond and was 
circulator and reporter for the Hammond Tribune until January, 1898, when 
he entered the real estate and insurance business in connection with his 
father. In 1899 h^ bought his father's interest, and has since conducted the 
business alone, dealing in city and countr}^ property on an extensive scale 
and annually writing large amounts of insurance for the standard companies. 

In politics Mr. Irish is a Republican, and is one of the city commis- 
sioners. He affiliates with Hammond Lodge No. 210, Knights of Pythias, 
and with Pioneer Council No. 38, Royal League. He and his wife are 
members of the First Presbyterian church of the city, and he is an elder. 
He purchased his present good home at 628 May street in 1897. He was 
married, September 30, 1891, to Miss Eva A. Pierce, and their family 
circle now contains two daughters, Zella Gertrude and Blanche Marie. 

Mrs. Irish is a daughter of Israel R. and Mary C. (Atkin) Pierce, the 
former a native of Ontario, Canada, and the latter of Ohio. Her paternal 
grandfather was James Pierce, who came from Canada to the United States, 
and lived at Valparaiso, Indiana, many years. He died in advanced years. 
By his wife, Jane (Lane) Pierce, he had three sons and three daughters. 
Mrs. Irish's maternal grandparents were Major B. and Betsey (Banks) At- 
kin, five of whose children are still living: he was a farmer and lived in 
Crown Point during the last fifteen years of his life, which ended in 1897: 
he was a Republican. Mrs. Irish's father was a farmer and an early settler 
in Indiana, having left Canada when he was eight years old. He lived on a 
farm near Merrillville from before the war until his death, on April 2^,, 1885. 
when forty-nine years old. He served as a private in the Civil war for three 
years, being in many important battles and in Sherman's campaign to the 
sea. He was a Republican, and he and his wife, who survives him. were 
both Methodists. They had five children, four of whom are now living: 
Jennie, wife of Alva Saxton. of Merrillville, Indiana: Carrie, wife of Robert 
Saxton, of Merrillville; Eva A., wife of Mr. Irish: Ernest L. Pierce, of 
Crown Point : and one that died in infancy. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 571 

ARMANIS F. KNOTTS. 

Armanis F. KiKitts, mayor of Hammond and since 1888 continuously 
engageii in law practice in this city, is an able, industrious and successful 
member of the Lake county bar, and deserves all the more credit because 
he arrived at his present prominent position by diligent application early 
and late from the days of boyhood. He has spent nearly all his active career 
in northwestern Indiana, and for a number of years was a successful school 
teacher, by which profession he entered uiion his broader field of activitv in 
the law and public life. He is one of the infiuential Republicans of Lake 
county, and to the social, institutional, professional and political affairs of 
his community has given a generous share of his time anil effort. 

Mr. Knotts was born in Highland county, Ohio, February 29. i860, a 
son of Frank D. and Margaret (Bell) Knotts, the former a native of Penn- 
sylvania and the latter of Ohio. His mother was a daughter of an early 
settler and farmer of Ohio, of Irish descent, and wIkt reared a large family. 
On the paternal side the family is of Holland Dutch stock, from early settlers 
in Maryland, and the great-grandfather was a soldier in the Revolution. The 
grandfather, a soldier in the war of 18 12, moved to Ohio at an early day, 
and lived there till his death at the age of seventy years, ha\ing reared a 
large family. 

Frank D. Knotts, the father of Mayor Knotts, has followed the occupa- 
tions of carpenter and farmer principally. When he was quite )'oung he 
moved with his parents to Ohio, and in 1868 came to Indiana, locating first 
in Tipjiecanoe county, near Lafayette, and afterward at Medaryville, Pulaski 
county, where he was engaged in farming, but now lives in the town. He 
is a Democrat in politics, and has held \arious township offices. His first 
wife died in 1870. at the age of twenty-nine years, and he married for his 
second wife ^liss Jennie Yates, who became the mother of two children: 
Nettie, the wife of Nandis Cox, of Medaryville: and William, of Medaryville. 

Mayor Knotts was eight years old when he came with his parents to 
Indiana, and he grew to manhood in Pulaski county, being reared on a farm 
and learning its duties at an early age. He laid the foundation for his larger 
training while a student in the district schools, and later attended the normal 
school at Valparaiso. After leaving the home schools he had taught for 
some time in the country schools and in ]\Iedaryville. He spent five years 



572 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

at \^alparaiso, and graduated in the classical course in 1883. He then taught 
two years at Ladoga, heing principal of the Centra! Lidiana Normal and 
Business College. He then returned to Valparaiso, where he took the law 
course and was graduated in 1887. In 1888 he opened his office in Ham- 
mond, and has been successfully practicing in this city ever since. He was 
elected county surveyor of Porter county while in school in Valparaiso, and 
held the office eighteen months, resigning when he came to Hammond. Since 
coming to Hammond he has been much interested in Republican politics. He 
was elected and served one term in the state legislature, from 1898. In May, 
1902, he was elected mayor of Hammond, and has given a very efficient 
administration of municipal aiifairs. 

Mr. Knotts resides at 8 Clinton street, where he built a comfortable 
home in 1892. He affiliates with Garfield Lodge No. 569, F. & A. M., with 
Hammond Chapter No. 117, R. A. M., and with Hammond Commandery, K. 
T. His wife and the children are members of the Catholic church. In 1884 he 
married Miss Mary Hennessy, a daughter of Michael Hennessy. They have 
had four children : Anna Frances, Eugenia, Leo and Marguerite. Leo died 
at the age of two vears. 



^s'- 



JAMES A. GILL. 

James A. Gill is well known in the business circles of Whiting, where 
his keen sagacitj^, enterprise and well directed efforts have led to his con- 
nection with important interests and his consecutive progress therein. He 
is now the superintendent of the wax-pressing department of the Standard Oil 
Company, is president of the Whiting Electric Light Company and is also a 
director of the First National Bank of Whiting. 

Mr. Gill was born in Cleveland, Ohio, on the 3d of January, 1865. 
His father, Isaac Gill, was a native of England and was reared in that 
country, remaining there until about thirty years of age, when, hoping to 
enjoy better business opportunities in the new world, he crossed the Atlantic, 
taking up his abode in Cleveland, Ohio. In that city he was united in mar- 
riage to Miss Barbara Heck, who was born in Germany and came to the 
United States after reaching womanhood. Isaac Gill was in the employ of 
the Standard Oil Company of Cleveland for thirty-eight years, in fact, he 
was one uf the pioneer representatives of the company and was employed 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 573 

directly by John D. Rockefeller. After the establishment of the plant at 
Whiting he came to this city, and here died in his seventieth }ear, while his 
wife also died when about seventy years of age. 

James A. Gill, their only child, spent the days of his boyhood and youth 
in the city of his nativity, and came to Whiting in 1889 when the Standard 
Oil Company located its manufacturing plant at this place. He acted as 
timekeeper for the brick-layers employed in the construction of the build- 
ings, was afterward made inspector of oils in the laboratory, filling that 
position for about three years. He was next appointed superintendent of 
the acid works, holding this position for about ten years, going from the 
acid works to the paraffine department, which position he now holds. He 
is one of the most trusted as well as capable representatives of the corpora- 
tion, and this department is always managed with excellent executive ability 
that results in efficient workmanship. As his financial resources have in- 
creased, owing to the increased wages that have come with promotion, he 
has been enabled to extend his efforts into other lines of activity and is now 
the president of the ^^'hiting Electric Light Company and one of the direc- 
tors and stockholders of the First National Bank of Whiting. He was one 
of the incorporators of the Petrolene Paint and Roofing Company, and was 
made its first president, resigning same some time ago, as the duties of the 
office were getting too great for him to handle in connection with his other 
business. He is also the owner of valuable real estate here and erected the 
first three-story brick block built in Whiting. 

In 1891 occurred the marriage of James A. Gill and Miss Carrie H. 
Halsey, a daughter of Charles Halsey. She was born and reared in Cleve- 
land, Ohio, and by her marriage has become the mother of two children : 
Jesse il. and Grace A. ]Mr. Gill is a stanch Republican who keeps well in- 
formed on the questions and issues of the day, but has never sought office as 
a reward for party fealty. Fraternally he is connected with the Masons, and 
he is also a member of the Owls Club, in which he formerly took a very- 
active part. He is deeply interested in the growth and progress of his adopted 
city, and has witnessed its development from its earliest inception to the 
present time. For fifteen years he has been connected with the upbuilding of 
the place, and has just reason to be proud of the fact that to his efforts can 
be traced several substantial enterprises and achievements contributing greatly 



574 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

to the prosperity and progress of Whiting. In e\er\' sense of the word he is 
a representative citizen dexoted to tlie welfare of liis chosen state and coni- 
mnnity and loyal to the g()\eniment. 

WARREN HENRY HAYWARD. 

Perhaps the majority of Lake county families have some visible evidence 
of Mr. Hayward's artistic work in. their homes, and there are certainly very 
few families in the county that ha\'e not some knowledge of who Mr. Hay- 
ward is and what his life work represents in the way of fine art. For over 
a quarter of a century he has been the leading photographer of Lake county, 
and in a profession which, during the last decades of the nineteenth century, 
made as phonomenal advancement as any other science he kept up with the 
rapid pace of improvement, and as he stood for the highest type of art in the 
seventies and eighties so now in the early years of the twentieth century he 
takes the palm in competition with the masters of the profession. The prob- 
able secret of Mr. Hayward's success is that he has from his first acquaintance 
with photography as a profession been enthusiastic and invincibly industrious 
in its pursuit, and he spared none of the resources of body or mind in his 
preparation for the work. 

Mr. Hayward is a native son of Lake county and the county has been 
his home and center of activity nearly all his years. He was born in Ross 
township, June 25, 1852, being the eldest son of Henry and Martha D. 
(Kronkright) Hayward, the former a native of England and the latter of 
Vermont. Henry Hayward emigrated with' his parents to Canada when he 
was eight years old, and a few years later the family home was located in 
Lake county. After his marriage Henry Hayward entered eighty acres of 
land in Ross township, and his industry and successful management increased 
this estate to three hundred and twenty acres, on which fine farm he lived 
until 1897, when he moved into Crown Point. After living there for a few 
years he moved out to Santa Barbara, California, where he now lives in re- 
tirement from a career of activity that has been splendidly useful and fruitful. 

Warren H. Hayward attended the common schools of his township 
during the winter seasons, and when summer came he was at home helping 
on the farm. This routine of boyhood he continued until he was eighteen 
vears old, and he then entered the Valparaiso Male and Female Methodist 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 575 

Episcopal College, where he remained two years until his graduation in 
the commercial department. On his return home he decided to teach dis- 
trict school during the winter seasons, and was accordingly examined and 
received a license to engage in pedagogic work. He was hired to teach 
a winter term in Ross township, but before the term began he had settled 
upon his definite life occupation, and his resignation was therefore sent in 
and accepted by the school authority. 

It was Mr. Hayward's plan to launch into the photographic business 
at Valparaiso as a full partner with his uncle, who had had much experience 
in the profession. In order to learn his part of the work Mr. Hayward at 
once commenced in what was then the best studio in Chicago, the firm of 
Copelin and Melander. where he paid ten dollars a week tuition fee. and at 
the end of six weeks graduated from their printing and finishing rooms. At 
Valparaiso the partnership of E. J. and W. H. Hayward was carried on for 
a little over a year, and then the junior partner tought out his uncle's interest 
on account of the latter's failing health, and for the following two years con- 
tinued the business alone. He then sold out and returned to Chicago in 
order to continue his professional training ?.nd prepare himself for the ex- 
tended career in photography which he saw was opening up before him. 

On May lo, 1876. Mr. Hayward married Miss Jessie Indiana Bliss, 
the youngest daughter of Captain H. G. and Louise M. Bliss, of Crown 
Point. On the day following the marriage they left for Santa Barbara. Cali- 
fornia, where for a year Mr. Hayward was manager of a large photographic 
business. He then returned to Crown Point and in September, 1877, started 
in business for himself. He has made Crown Point his headquarters ever 
since, and at different times has also conducted branch establishments at 
Hammond and Lowell. 

]Many things prove the high estimate in which Mr. Hayward's art is 
held, not only in Lake county but wherever it has come into competition 
with other work. He was selected by the G. H. Hammond Company packing 
house ofificials to make a set of interior and exterior photographs of their 
plant, which were to be sent and placed on exhibition at the Paris exposition 
of igoo. He has likewise taken many prizes on pictures entered in various 
competitions, and he was awarded a bronze medal at the National Conven- 
tion of Photographers at St. Louis in 1894. 



576 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

From childhood Mr. Hayward has found his greatest recreative pleasure 
in the rod and gun, and his vacations have usually been spent on the banks 
of the Kankakee river, whence many times he has brought home a hundred 
ducks and geese that have fallen before his accurate and practiced marks- 
manship. When wild game became scarce he interested himself for several 
years in trap-shooting as a diversion, and won numerous prizes and medals 
in competition with Chicago's best shooters. Fraternally ]\Ir. Hayward is a 
member of the Independent Order of Foresters of America, the Knights of 
Pythias, and the National Union. He is also a member of the Crown Point 
Commercial Club, and at this writing has the honor of being its president, 
now serving his second term as such. This club is primarily a social organiza- 
tion, but at the same time is always looking out for the best interests of the 
town and has efifected much for its welfare in the past. 

Three children have come to bless the home of IMr. and Mrs. Hayward. 
Nina Louise was born June 20, 1878, and on Christmas day of 1900 married 
Frank E. Daily, of Chicago. By this daughter ^Ir. and Mrs. Hayward 
have a little grandson, Milton Hayward Daily, who is now three years old, 
having been born November 21. 1901. Harry Bliss, the only son, was born 
August 28, 1879, and after spending five years in the study of medicine in 
Chicago graduated in 1902, and is now located at Valley Mills, Texas, where 
he is practicing his profession with flattering success. Neva Belle, the 
youngest of the family, was born April 21, 1881, and on January 12, 1904, 
married John T. Daily, of Chicago. The two daughters married brothers. 
This happy family is well known and highly esteemed in the social circles 
of Crown Point, and both children and parents individually have found and 
I ' are performing worthy parts in the world's affairs. 

JAMES HERVEY BALL, Esq. 

James H. Ball, of whom a likeness is here given, youngest son of Judge 
Hervey Ball, was fifteen months of age when his father settled at Cedar 
Lake. A student for a time at Franklin College in Indiana, he became a 
teacher in the public schools of Lake county, and at length school examiner 
of the county. He held as county examiner the third, fourth, fifth, sixth and 
seventh county institutes. He made the first official school visitations before 
they were required by law. 




JAMES H. BALL 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 577 

In 1 87 1 he graduated at tlie Law School of the University of Chicago. 
He was in active life in Lake county for several years. He has been for 
some time a resident in Scott. Kansas, where he has a law office, and he has 
been for two terms probate judge of Scott county. 

Before leaving Crown Point he erected four brick dwelling houses which 
still remain as memorials of his enterprise, as well as his work for many 
years in educational lines. 

He now holds, in Scott county, quite a tract of land, through which 
flows a stream of water, making it valuable for grass and for pasturage. 
On this pasture land he keeps some fine cattle of the Galloway variety. His 
place is called "Edith Ranch." 

JOHN J. WHEELER. 

John J. \Vheeler. proprietor and publisher of the Lake County Star at 
Crown Point, the newspaper known as possessing the best equipment and the 
largest circulation of any paper in northwestern Lidiana, is a representative 
of the journalistic fraternity whose present prosperous and successful posi- 
tion in life has been won by hard and persevering labor and serious attention 
to the interests which of his own responsibility he has assumed or which 
ha\e lieen intrusted to him through circumstances. His career, like that of 
many newspaper men, has been varied and concerned with several fields of 
human activity; and, also, his entire life spent within the bailiwick of Lake 
county has brought him into most intimate relations with its citizenship and 
industries, — forming experiences and associations of inestimable value in the 
conduct of a local journal. The Lake County Star is a conservative journal 
in that it adheres to the best traditions and policies of the past, whether in 
political or material afTairs, but is also exceedingly progressive in that its 
point of view broadens with the advance of the decades and it continually 
advocates the upbuilding of the county and state and a betterment of all the 
vital conditions of society and the world in general. The Star is an influential 
organ, contains the best winnowings of the local news, and both as an indi- 
cator and director of public opinion its strength has long been felt in Lake 
county. 

Mr. Wheeler is a native son of West Creek township. Lake countv, and 
was born in that prosperous agricultural section of the county January 11, 

S7 



578 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

1848. The Wheeler family originally came from Connecticut, and this 
branch is from the same strain as is General Joe Wheeler, the famous little 
rebel general, but the political associations of the Lake county Wheelers 
have always adhered to the Union and Republicanism. 

Mr. Wheeler's father was John Wheeler, and his mother Ann Wheeler, 
a daughter of John D. Jones. These parents came from Ohio to Indiana in 
1847. The father first engaged in school teaching, later was county sur- 
veyor of Lake county, and in 1857 founded the Crown Point Register, which 
he continued to publish until June, 1861. He then entered the Union army 
as captain of Company B, Twentieth Indiana Infantry, and in the spring of 
1863 he was promoted to colonel of the command. He had been in all the 
Potomac battles up to that time, and on the second day of the great Gettys- 
burg engagement he was shot from his horse and instantly killed at the 
"Devil's Den," July 2, 1863. His children are John J., Edgar C, and Alice 
M., now Mrs. S. S. Cole, of East Brookfield. Their mother died in the 
seventies. 

John J. Wfieeler received a very meager education in the country schools 
of this county, nor did his opportunities of school attendance long continue, 
since he was obliged to make his own way from the time he was fourteen 
years old. For several years he clerked in a store. He entered the army 
when he was fifteen years old, and he now possesses two honorable dis- 
charges, showing that his youth did not hinder him from performing a full 
meed of patriotic service to his country. His field of life work has always 
been in Lake county, and he was twice elected to the office of county Sur- 
veyor. While in tlie second term of this office he resigned in order to enter 
the newspaper business, which he has followed since 1872. He has owned 
his present fine newspaper plant for twenty-four years, and is among the 
oldest as he is one of the most successful publishers in northwest Indiana. 
During Harrison's term of president he served Crown Point as postmaster, 
and it is needless to state that he has always been a stanch Republican in 
political faith. He has been a member of the Masonic fraternity for thirty- 
three years, and also a Forester, and has been identified with the Grand 
Army of the Republic since its organization. He is eclectic in his religious 
views. 

Mr. Wheeler was married to Miss Belle Holton, October 27, 1870, at 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 579 

Crown Point. Slie was a granddaugliter of Solon Robinson, who figures so 
prominently in this history as the founder of Crown Point; he was a remark- 
able man in many other ways, was the author of numerous lx)oks, and for 
many years was agricultural editor of the New York Tribune. Mr. and Mrs. 
Wheeler have two sons and two daughters. Harold H., the eldest, is now 
serving his second term as county clerk, and when his time expires he will 
have been connected with that office for twenty-two years, he having been 
deputy fourteen years. Fred, the second son, is f(ireman in the Star office. 
Jennie A., the older daughter, is now Mrs. W. P. Tice, and Josephine C, 
aged fifteen, is still at home. 

Mr. \\'heeler's career is its own best justification, and he has every reason 
to be satisfied with the outcome of the battle of life as he has fought it. He 
is prosperous and a highly esteemed man i>f affairs in his county, and a 
conscientious and diligent devotion to the work of the present world makes 
him content with what his lot will be when he is called upon to cross the 
great unknown. 

DR. JAMES GILBERT VAN DeWALKER. 

Dr. James Gilbert Van DeWalker, a prominent and well known physi- 
cian and surgeon residing at 712 Johnson street, Hammond, Indiana, has 
been numbered among the popular practitioners of this city for over twenty 
years, and has been engaged in professional work for nearly a half century. 
His long life has been full of useful activity, and he has been identified with 
many enterprises botli public and private during his career. He is a man of 
breadth and harmony of character, and his energetic disposition and large 
intelligence have brought him into relationship with all kinds of people and 
with various activities. He is one of the veteran soldiers of the republic, and 
has also been a lawyer of no mean ability, and has taken his full share in 
the social, fraternal, political and pulilic affairs of the various communities 
where he has had his home. 

Dr. Van DeWalker was born in Otsego county. New York, January 
31. 1 83 1. He is a descendant of one of three brothers wdio settled in New 
York during the early Dutch colonization of that state, and the family 
has been numbered among the Knickerbocker houses of New York. Martin 
Van DeWalker, the grandfather of Dr. Van DeWalker, was a native New 



580 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

York farmer, and several of his brothers were Revokitionary soldiers. He — 
and the same has been true of the family in general — lived to an advanced 
age, dying when he was ninety-five years old, and his wife, whose maiden 
name was Christina Flansbury, lived to be still older. 

John \'an De^^'alker, the father of Dr. De^^'alker, was a native of 
New York state, was a farmer there, and about 1842 came west and settled 
in Pleasant township, LaPorte county, Indiana, where he bought a farm and 
lived until his death, in 1889, at the age of eighty-one years. He and his 
wife, who died in 1880. at the age of seventy-seven, were both members of 
the Methodist Protestant church. His wife's maidei> name was Nancy 
Thompson, a native of New York and a daughter of Robert Thompson. 
The latter was a New York farmer, and for a short time was a soldier in tlv 
war of 1812* He married Elizabeth Hull, an own cousin of General Hull, 
who surrendered at Detroit, and also a cousin of General Stark, who fought 
at the battle of Bennington, Vermont, where she was born. Robert Thomp- 
son died at the age of forty-five, and his wife lived to be eighty years old. 
They bad three sons and three daughters. Robert Thompson's father was 
known as Colonel Thompson. He was the founder (if the family in America, 
bavins come from the north of Ireland and settled in Cherrv Vallev, New" 
York, a short time before the Indian massacre. John and Nancy Van De- 
Walker had six sons and three daughters, and the three now living are Dr. 
James G. ; Emma Jane, the widow^ of W. T. Horine, of Washington, D. C. ; 
and Elizabeth, the wife of Preston Green, of Lapaz, Indiana. 

Dr. James G. Van DeWalker was about eleven years old when he left 
New York state and came to Indiana with his father, and he grew to manhood 
on the farm in LaPorte county. He attended the district schools, and later 
studied bv the light of a tallowdip, and in the main he is a self-educated 
man, having gained by hard efforts all the advantages for education and in- 
tellectual development. After leaving home he studied with an uncle, Dr. 
Pierce, of Momence, Illinois, and up to the time of the Civil war did a small 
practice. He enlisted in 1862 in Company B, Twelfth Indiana Infantry, and 
served till the close of the war. He was in the battle at Richmond, Ken- 
tucky, in the siege of Vicksburg, at Jackson, Mississippi, at Missionary 
Ridge, and ;dl the fifteen engagements of the Fifteenth Army Corps during 
the .\tlanta campaign. He was then with Sherman to the sea, thence up 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 581 

through the Carohnas. the last battle being at Bentonville. In 1863 the 
officers had learned that he was a physician, and put him on duty as hospital 
steward, and he was assigned to General John A. Logan's. Fifteenth Army 
Corps headquarters, where lie ser\ed till the close of the war in 1865. 

After the war he practiced medicine at Lisbon, Xoble county, Indiana, 
until 1868; from then until 1875 was at Lafayette; until the fall of 1878 
was at Medaryville. Indiana : then moved to Davenport. Nebraska, and prac- 
ticed until 1882, in which year he took up what has proved his permanent 
location at Hammond, where he has carried on a successful practice ever 
since. Right after the war he also studied law. and was admitted to the bar 
in Pulaski county. Indiana, in 1876. and practiced that profession there until 
1878, and also in Nebraska. He had served as marshal of Valparaiso in 1856. 

]\Iarch 22. 1856. Dr. Van De^^'alker married ]Miss ]Mary Beattie. wh.o 
died Januar}' 21, 1891. On ]March 31. 1892, he married Mrs. Jennie Simp- 
son, the widow of Robert Harrison Simpson and a daughter of Daniel and 
Ann (Shannahan) Foley, Dr. Van De\\'alker is a member of the First 
Congregational church. He afhliates with Calumet Lodge No. 601. I. O. 
O. F.. and John A. Logan Encampment No. 95. He belongs to the Colonel 
Robert Heath Post No. 544. G. A. R., of the Department of Indiana. He 
is a member of tlie Lake County Medical Society, an honorary member of 
the Nebraska Eclectic Medical .\ssociation. and a charter member of the 
Indiana State Eclectic Association. In jiolilics he is a Re])ul)Hcan. He was 
secretary of the board of health r>f Hammi^ud for eight years, was county 
physician tweh'e years and county coroner two years. He has also beer, 
pension attorney for a number of years. He bought his present home and 
added improvements, and also luiilt liis office on the same lot. 

JOSEPH STARK. 

Joseph Stark is a represenlati\-e of the best ideals in agriculture, citi- 
zenship and personal character, and as such he is held in the highest esteem 
in Lake county, and especially througlmut \\'est Creek township, where the 
years of his activity have been passed. 

He is a native of St. John township, this county, and was horn December 
30. 1859, being the fourth in a family of eleven children, seven sons and 
four daughters, born to Joseph and Mary Ann (Merrick) Stark. There are 



5S2 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

nine of the children still living, as follows : Afra. who is the wife of 
Matthew Herman, a farmer of St. John township : John, who is a prosperous 
farmer of West Creek township, and who has a sketch elsewhere in this 
book; Mary, the wife of Jacob Klassen. a retired farmer of St. John; Joseph: 
Frank, a resident farmer at St. John, who married Aliss Amelia Koeblin ; 
George, who resides on the old homestead and who married Miss Rosa Thiel ; 
Michael, who is a butter-maker at St. John, and married Miss Mary Schreiner : 
Peter, a farmer of St. John, who married Miss Lizzie Klassen ; and Frances, 
who resides with her mother at St. John. The children were all confirmed 
in the Catholic church, and Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Stark are members of St. 
Martin's church at Hanover Center. 

The senior Joseph Stark, the father of this large family, was born in 
the province of Bavaria, Germany, December 30, 1824, and died March 17, 
1879. He was deprived of his mother's care when six years old, and at the 
age of thirteen began to earn his own way in life. He worked day and 
night in a mill until he was twenty-two years of age. and his wages were 
wonderfully meager when compared with those paid by twentieth century 
American prosperity. He had a common school education in his native 
tongue, but in the main was self-trained and self-educated. He was always 
reckoned as a man of character and solid manhood. At the age of twenty- 
two he took passage on a sailing vessel at Bremerhaven, bound for the free 
land of America, and at the end of six weeks he landed in New York city. 
At tliis stage of his career he was three dollars in debt, and the first thing 
he did in the new world was to work three days and clear himself of this 
incumbrance. He then worked his way to Chicago, where he was employed 
on the docks until cold weather, when he obtained work from a minister, 
being, in fact, willing to accept anything that would earn him an honest 
dollar. After remaining in Chicago for thirteen months he enlisted as a 
soldier in the ^Mexican war, and served throughout that important struggle. 
After the war he traveled through South America, where he was very much 
pleased with all he saw, and thence he returned to New York by ship and finally 
arrived in Chicago again. He and two other men purchased teams and 
drove through to California, but on the great salt desert the horses perished, 
and the remaining distance they were compelled to cover on foot. Mr. Stark 
was in California thirteen months, and during that time he dug out of the 



a 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 583 

ground tiiree thousand dollars in gold. He returned on foot to Chicago, 
got married, and for a year farmed on rented government land at Home- 
wood. Illinois. He came to St. John in Lake county, about 1859, and lived 
here till the end of his useful and busy life. He owned four hundred and 
forty acres in St. John township, and when it is recalled how lie started out 
in young manhood with less than nothing, and before he had reached the 
meridian of his career, had gained a competency for those days, he must be 
recorded in this history as one of the truly successful and worthy men of 
the past who have made Lake county what it is at the present. In politics he 
was a loyal Democrat, and he and his wife were devout Catholics. His 
■wife, Mar}^ Ann Stark, was born in Alsace. Germany, in June, 1836, and 
is now living in St. John, a hale and hearty old lady. 

Mr. Joseph Stark, who was born on the same day of the month with 
his father and who received the latter's name, was reared and has spent prac- 
tically all his life in Lake county. His education was obtained in the 
parochial schools. He has made farming and stock-raising his vocation, and 
has been more than ordinarily successful in all his enterjjrises. 

He remained at home and cared for his mother until he was twenty- 
five years old. and on February 5, 1885, he married Miss Susan Thiel. They 
have been made happy by the birth of ten children into their home, four 
sons and six daughters, and all but one of these are still living, as follows : 
Tillie S.. who is in the seventh grade of school and is a piano student; 
Frances AI., who is in the eighth grade and also a music student ; Josephine 
is in the eighth grade and takes music ; George, who is now in the German 
school; Edward J., who is in the fifth grade; Joseph, in the fourth grade; 
Oliva E. ; ^Madeline M. ; and Christina B., the baby of the family. Mrs. 
Stark was born in Lake coimty. March 17, 1864, and was educated in the 
parochial schools. Her parents were Mathias and Susan (Laurerman) Thiel. 
Her father was born near the Rhine river, and was ele\-en years old when he 
accompanied his parents to America and to Lake county, and he lived in this 
county until his death, on November 10. 1901. At the time of his death 
he owned a farm of one hundred and forty-eight acres in St. John township, 
and also had real estate in Hammond. He was a Democrat in politics, and 
he and his wife were Catholics. There were eleven children in the Thiel 
family, and ten are living, six of them residents of Lake county, and those 



584 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

elsewhere are: Katie, wife of George Thielen, a farmer of Cresco, Howard 
county, Iowa ; Mathias L. is a merchant of Chicago, and is married ; Frank, 
who was born June 2, 1870. and was educated in the parochial schools, is a 
resident of Chicago, and married Miss Lena Keilman. who was born in 
Lake county, November 17, 1873, and educated in the common schools, both 
of them being Catholics : nnd Andrew, who is a merchant of Chicago, and is 
a married man. 

Mr. Stark is independent in politics, casting his vote for the best man 
in his judgment. He is the owner of one hundred and sixty acres of land 
in West Creek township, and on this he has recently erected a beautiful and 
comfortable farm residence. The farm is improved with good buildings and 
other conveniences, and the entire place has a progressive and prosperous 
appearance. He is a stock fancier, and takes much pride in his fine cattle and 
hogs. He is a shareholder in the West Creek creamer}-, which is located 
near his property. 

Biographical Sketch of WILLIAM CLINTON MURPHEY. 
Corporal, Company B, One Hundred Thirty-ninth Indiana Infantry 
IN THE Civil War, Merchant and Banker. 

The Murphey family in Henry county is as old as the county itself. 
The family came originally from North Carolina, for it was in the old North 
State that Miles Murphey and Dorothy Evans were united in marriage. 
Thev were the parents of sixteen children, six of whom died in North Caro- 
lina. About 1820 the family determined to emigrate to Indiana, and, coming 
to this state, they settled first in \\'ayne county, bringing their ten surviving 
children with them. In the spring of 1822, the same year that Henry county 
was organized, the family moved to what is now Henry county and settled 
on Flat Rock, two and one-half miles southeast of the present town of New 
Castle. One of the ten surviving children was a son, named Clement, born 
in North Carolina, December 23, 1808. In 1827, near New Castle, he 
married Huldah Bundy, also a nati\e of North Carolina, and soon thereafter 
settled on a piece of land and started out to make a farm in Prairie township, 
about four miles northeast of New Castle. Clement and Huldah Murphey 
were the parents of fifteen children, eight hoys and seven girls, viz. : Joel L., 
Hiram B., Francis M., Robert P., Eli C, William C, Miles E. and John F. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 585 

The daughters were named Ehzabeth, Sarah J., ^lary, Alartha, Eliza J., 
Huldah E. and Catlierine. Clement Murphey Ijecame a prominent farmer 
and was one among the most successful agriculturists that ever lived in 
Henry county. He and his wife were upright, religious people and took great 
interest in church and educational matters. They were very highly respected 
by all who knew them, and the good name which they left behind them is a 
valuable legacy to their children. In i860 Mr. Murphey retired from his 
farm and moved to New Castle, where he and his excellent wife continued 
to reside until the day of their death. 

William Clinton Murphey, the sixth son, is the subject of this sketcli. 
He was born on his father's farm above mentioned, Januarv i, 1842. He 
lived with his parents, working or. the farm and attending the public schools, 
until i860, when he accompanied his parents to New Castle. He early de- 
veloped mercantile and business qualities of a high order. In the fall of 
i860 he became a clerk in the hardware store of his brother, Joel L., in 
New Castle, and soon after obtaining- his majority in 1863, he had a hard- 
ware store of his own. Later he moved to Middletown in Henry county, 
and engaged in the dry-goods trade, remaining there for a period of about 
two years, when he returned to New Castle, where he continued in the dry- 
goods business until the summer of 1868, when he engaged in the grocery 
business, which he operated until the fall of 187 1. In the fall of this year 
came the turning point in ]\Ir. Murphey's business career, for at this time he 
was induced by Mr. George Hazzard of New Castle to dispose of his grocery 
store and engage in the banking business. 

A firm was formed consisting of George Hazzard, \\'illiam C. Murphev 
and Reuben Tobey, under the firm name of Hazzard, Murphey and Co., op- 
erating a private bank, known as the Citizens Bank of New Castle, with a 
combined capital of $40,000, ten thousand dollars of which was contributed 
by Mr. Murphey. This venture was highly successful, so much so that in 
the summer of 1873 these partners, with some new capital solicited in Henrv 
county, were able to and did organize, under the laws of the state of Indiana, 
the Citizens State Bank of New Castle, with a capital of $130,000, of which 
bank Mr. Murphey was made cashier. 

In 1874 there was not a banking institution of any kind in Lake countv. 
Indiana. Now there are, perhaps, twenty such organizations in the county. 



588 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Neither was there a banking institution of any kind on the line of the Penn- 
sylvania railroad, between Logansport and Chicago. This unoccupied terri- 
tory was certainly an inviting field, and accordingly Mr. iVlurphev disposed 
of his interests in the Citizens State Bank of New Castle, when he together 
with Martin L. Bundy, George Hazzard and Augustus E. Bundy of New 
Castle, and John Brown, William ^\'. Cheshire, David Turner, James Burge. 
James H. Luther and perhaps one other of Crown Point, the latter taking 
$i,ooo each in the capital stock, organized the First National Bank of Crown 
Point, with a capital of $50,000, Mr. Murphey becoming \ice president. 
Later the other parties from New Castle .sold their stock in the bank, and 
]\Ir. Murphey became cashier, a position he held vmtil physically disabled 
for further service. With this bank Mr. Murphey was continuously identi- 
fied as the controlling spirit from the date of its organization until the close 
of his business career. Under his management the bank was highly success- 
ful. It accumulated a surplus fund equal to its capital, and so desirable was 
the stock as an investment that it readily sold for two hundred and fifty 
dollars a share. The par value of the shares was one hundred dollars each. 
It was in Crown Point that he made his great reputation as a prudent and 
sagacious business man and banker, and it was there also that he accumulated 
the fortune of a quarter of a million dollars which he left at the time of his 
death. 

In the Civil war Mr. Murphey was not forgetful of the patriotic duty 
which every citizen owes to the government, for he became a soldier in 
Company B, One Hundred Thirty-ninth Indiana Infantry, being mustered 
into the United States service as a corporal June 5, 1864, and mustered out 
September 29, 1864. 

At New Castle on the 29th day of November, 1866, he was married to 
Alice lone, second daughter of Joshua and Nancy Holland, old and highly 
respected citizens of Henry county. Mrs. Murphey was a native of New 
Castle where she lived all her life. She was highly esteemed by all who 
knew her. She died December 22, 1869, and her tody now lies at rest in 
Ijeautiful South ?kIound cemetery. From this union there was one child, a 
daughter. .\nna Florence, born October 12, 1867. This loving child was 
not permitted to reach her full estate, for while at the O.xford (Ohio) Fe- 
male College, she was suddenly stricken and died. February 22. 1885. Her re- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 587 

mains were laitl at the side of her mother in Snutii Mound cemetery. Her 
death was a great sliock to lier father, wiio never fully reco\-ered from the 
great loss then inflicted. 

On November 22. 1882. Mr. Murphey again married, tliis time to Louise 
I\L Luther, iicc Louise M. Whippo, now his surviving widow, a most esti- 
mable woman, liighly educated and who was horn at Dulilin. Wayne county, 
Indiana, September 9, 1844. It was after Mr. Murphey's union with Mrs, 
Luther that his greatest success and prosperity came to him. She proved in 
every way a true wife, a good companion and a great business helpmeet. It 
was with the most tender solicitude that she cared for Mr. Murphey during 
his last years of almost total helplessness and supervised his business affairs. 
Mr. Murphey died July 21, i8g8, at Crown Point, Indiana. 

On .\ugust 3, 1895, while engaged in the duties of his position at the 
bank, Mr. Murphey was stricken with paralysis. For days he hovered be- 
tween life and death, but finally a change for the better came, and as soon as 
he was able to travel he was taken to southern California, where with the 
warm sun and genial climate he rapidly improved and in May was aljle to 
return home. But in November he returned to California, spending the winter 
in Los Angeles. In I\Iay be again came home, but soon left for Mt. Clemens, 
Michigan, where he hoped to find his health restored. He did receive some 
benefit, but in the fall again went to California, remaining until spring. He 
was failing before his departure for home, and on his return was confined to 
the bed for some days, but for ten weeks he was able to be out and meet his 
old friends, liut Anally the fatal disease was more than his heroic efYorts 
could overcome and death claimed its own. 

For many years Mr. Murphey had been an earnest advocate of crema- 
tion, as the proper method of disposing of the dead, and, in accordance with 
his often expressed wish and direction, that disposition was made of his 
remains, and his ashes deposited by the side of his wife and only child in 
South Mound cemetery. New Castle. 

No man that ever lived in Lake county, for that matter in northwestern 
Indiana, left behind him a more enviable reputation for prudence, sagacity 
and sterling integrity than William Clinton Murphey. His judgment was 
the controlling factor in all disputed business affairs, throughout Lake county. 
He was an excellent person for one in doubt to consult, for he could take 



588 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

up the case and point out the uncertainties as well as the winning points. 
His advice was sought far and wide. He was a man of polished manners 
and pleasing address. His memory will long be cherished by all who knew 
him. 

ALBERT C. HUBER. 

The prosperity of any city or locality depends upon its commercial and 
industrial activity, and the early upbuilders of a town are they who suc- 
cessfully conduct business enterprises. A representative of this class is Albert 
C. Huber, who is now engaged in dealing in groceries, market supplies and 
coal in East Chicago. He is a native of Ohio, his Ijirth having occurred in 
Seneca county, that state, on the 14th of February. 1874. Little is known 
concerning the ancestral history of the family save that the Hubers are of 
German lineage. The paternal grandfather spent his entire life in Germany, 
and in that country Michael Huber, the father of Albert C, was born, the 
place of his nativity being Luxemburg. In early life he learned the wagon- 
builder's trade and about 1830 he came to America, locating in Berwick, 
Seneca county, Ohio, where he was engaged in wagon building. There he 
died in the year 1876. His wife survived him until January 13, 1903, and 
passed away at the ripe old age of seventy-four years. Both were communi- 
cants of the Catholic church. Mrs. Michael Huber, who bore the maiden 
name of Margaret Sachas, was also a native of Luxemburg, Germany, and 
was a daughter of Nicholas Sachas, who was born in Germany and came 
to the United States in 1830 with a small colony of people that established 
a settlement in Seneca county, Ohio. He was a carpenter and bridge builder, 
and in Seneca county spent his remaining days, departing this life at an 
advanced age. In his family were fi\e children. 

To Mr. and Mrs. Michael Huber were born ten children, five sons and 
five daughters, of whom five are yet living, namely: Elizabeth A., a resident 
of Pullman, Illinois; Mary, who is the wife of D. H. Chapman, of Kensing- 
ton, Illinois; Michael W., who is living in Austin, a suburb of Chicago; Ida, 
the widow of Thornton Berry, and now of Pullman, Illinois; and .\lljert C, 
of this review. 

Albert C. Huljer resided in Seneca countv, Ohio, until sixteen years 
of age and in his liovhood days attended the parochial and public schools 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 589 

there. \\'lien nineteen _\ears of age he hegan learning the tinsmith's trade, 
Wiiich he followed continuously until 1899. He then turned his attention 
to the grocery business in East Chicago, forming a partnership with Thorn- 
ton Berry under the firm style of Huber, Berry & Company. This rela- 
tionship was maintained until 190^, when Mr. Berry died, and since that 
time the business has been conducted under the firm style of A. C. Huber & 
Company, his sister Elizabeth becoming his partner. He has a well appointed 
grocery store, and in addition also conducts a meat market. The tasteful 
arrangement and neat appearance of the store secures a good patronage, and 
Mr. Huber is always able to retain his customers because of his honorable 
business methods. He is likewise connected with the Lake Coal Company as 
a partner. In 1903 he established the Empire restaurant in East Chicago, but 
later sold out to Leo McCormack. 

On the 1 2th of February, 1901, Mr. Huber was united in marriage to 
]\Iiss Caroline M. Reiland, a daughter of John S. and Henrietta (Meisen- 
bach) Reiland. They have one daughter. Helen Ruth Huber. The parents 
hold membership in the Catholic church, and fraternally he is associated with 
the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and with the Royal League. 
Politically he is a Republican, having firm faith in the principles of the party 
as set forth in its platform. He is now serving as president of the board of 
education in East Chicago and is a citizen whose interest in the welfare of 
the town is deep and sincere and is manifested by active co-operation in many 
movements for the general good. He is yet a young man, but has already 
attained creditable success through honorable efifort, untiring industry and 
capable management, while in private life he has gained that warm personal 
regard which arises from true nobility of character, deference for the opinion 
of others' kindness and geniality. 

CHARLES GROMANN, M. D. 

In the German element of her citizenship Lake county has found a fac- 
tor of uplift and progress toward substantial ideals such as no other race has 
brought to the county, and this history would lack one of its most essential 
parts should the work and lives of the German-Americans be neglected. Dr. 
Gromann, whose professional career has made him so familiar to numerous 
families of the county, is a native of the little province of Lippe-Detmold, 



590 HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 

Germany, wliere he was born December 2, 1823. He is the younger of two 
children born to Phili]) and Dorothea (Witte) Gromann, and is the onlv 
survix'or of the family. The father was born in the same province in 1794 
and died in 1867. He was a lirick-maker l)y trade, and was a successful man 
throughout his life. He and his wife were Lutherans. 

Dr. Gromann was reared in his native land to the age of twenty-five 
years. He was fomierly a druggist by occupation, having taken a practical 
course in a store under an experienced pharmacist. In 1849 he cf)ncluded to 
come to America. He sailed from Bremerhaven. being si.x weeks on the 
voyage to New York, and from the latter city he went to Chicago, thence to 
Dalton, Illinois, where he and his brother-in-law purchased land and re- 
mained until the spring of 1853. Then the Doctor came to Hanover town- 
ship, Lake county, and purchased eighty acres of raw land. His first resi- 
dence there was a log cabin which he himself built, and he has seen deer and 
wolves roaming about in this county. In fact, he one day killed two deer 
Avithin a half an hour, shooting them with a shotgun, and also shot a bear 
from the window of his cabin. It was his intention to follow farming as 
his permanent occupation, but his health was poor and he took up the study 
of medicine. He went to Chicago and entered the office of Dr. Julius Ull- 
rich, with whom he carried on his studies, and he later came to Hanover 
township and began the medical practice which he has continuetl in this 
county for half a century. He is a genial and cordial gentleman and well 
preserved for his years, and his career has Ijeen such as to win him esteem 
in all circles. Dr. Gromann has been married three times. His first wife v.as 
Miss Caroline Kluckhohm. They became affianced in Germany, but were 
married in Chicago. Eleven children, six sons and five daughters, were born 
of this union, and nine are living, as follows : Wilhelmina, the eldest; Henry, 
of Crown Point ; August, a physician in Iowa ; Sophia and Caroline, twins, 
both wives of ministers: Charles; Louise; Fred; Anna. The mother of this 
family died in 1869, and Dr. Gromann's second wife was Miss Sophia Ort- 
meyer. Five children, one son and four daughters, were born of this union, 
and the three living are: Paulina, a professional nurse; Julia, wife of George 
Piepho, a prosperous farmer in Hanover township; and Dora, the youngest. 
This second wife passed away on February 5, 1897. On March 20, 1901, 
Dr. Gromann married Mrs. Charlotte (Bernhardt) Sauer. who was born 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 591 

near the city of Wiesbaden, Germany, November i, 1837, being a daughter 
of Jacob and Philopena (Weltert) Bernhardt. There were nine children in 
the Bernhardt family, but only two are li\ing. and Mrs. Gromann is the only 
one in America. She was educated in her native land, and is a Lutheran 
in religion. Her first marriage took place in Germany. In 1867 she came to 
America, and from Cincinnati later moved to Chicago. Mrs. Gromann is a 
genial and cordial lady, and with such a jovial companion as the jolly Doctor 
their home is truly a happy one. Their cosy, comfortable home is open to 
all their friends, and good cheer and congenial company are always to be 
found there. 

Dr. Gromann is a stalwart Republican, and has supported the candidates 
of the G. O. P. since casting his first vote. Ofiicially he was elected to the 
office of township trustee and served as such for nine years, during which 
period he erected the schoolhouse in Brunswick, and Ixsth before and since 
the cause of erlucation has always found in him a true friend. He was form- 
erly a memter of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. He and his good 
wife are members of the German Methodist church society, and they are 
well known and highly esteemed in their home town of Brunswick and also 
throughout the neighborhood. 

JOHN KRUDUP. 

The Germans form one of the most prosperous elements of state or 
nation, and are especially noteworthy for the part they have played in the 
substantial and enduring development of Lake county. Mr. Krudup was 
bom in Hanover township. Lake county, April 19, 1870, and is the youngest 
of the seven children, four sons and three daughters, born to Herman H. and 
Anna Elizabeth (Wilke) Krudup. There are four of the children still living. 
The eldest, Johanna, is the widow of John H. Meyer and a resident of West 
Creek township. Herman, who is married, is a salesman in a wholesale 
grocery house of Chicago. William F., married, is a dealer in harness and 
hardware at Gibson City, Illinois. And John is the youngest. 

Herman H. Krudup, the father, was a native of Germany, born in 1828. 
He was a farmer by occupation. He was married in Germany and 
about 1858 he came to America, arriving at New Orleans and 
making the trip up the Mississippi and the Ohio to Cincinnati, being 



592 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

two months and six days on the water. \Mien he came to Inchana 
he began as a farmer. He purchased eight}' acres of land, going in debt for 
part of it, and by diligence he not only paid for it, but added to his property 
until he had one hundred and sixty-seven acres, and fifteen acres of timljer- 
land. This land is now the property of Mr. John Krudup. The father was 
a Republican in politics. The mother was a native of Prussia. Germany, 
born in 1832, and her death occurred in 1892. 

Mr. Krudup was reared to the life of a farmer, and received his educa- 
tion in the common schools of the county, personal application being a prin- 
cipal factor in his success from the beginning of his career. At the age of 
twentv-one he began without capital, and at the age of twenty-seven he re- 
ceived his share of the estate. He has been careful and frugal, and has accu- 
mulated a good property and become well known for his effective business 
management. In March, 1904, he purchased the stock of merchandise of 
Hon. John Beckman, at Brunswick. This was a well established general 
■merchandise business, the stock consisting of dry-goods, shoes, staple and 
fancy groceries, queensware and other general goods. Mr. Krudup is a 
young and progressive business man, affable and genial, and his integrity 
and character and reputation for honesty and fair dealing are well known 
throughout his native community, where the people have all confidence in 
him, and his business career begun under such favorable auspices is certain 
to lead to success. 

March 17, 1898, Mr. Krudup married Miss Carrie Russell, and two 
daughters have been born to them, Emma M. and Edna J. Mrs. Krudup 
was born in Hanover township, this county, March 17, 1871, and was reared 
in the county and educated in the common schools. She is a daughter of 
Christopher and Johanna Russell, the former now deceased, and both her 
parents were born in Germany. 

Mr. Krudup is a stalwart Republican, having cast his first presidential 
vote for Benjamin Harrison, and having supported each candidate since. 
He and his wife are church members and are young people who stand high 
in the estimation of all who know them. 

JOHN N. BECKMAN. 

The German-American has played a conspicuous part in the affairs of 
this nation, and Lake county has been especially benefited by their presence 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 593 

and activity in the important industries and social and public affairs. As a 
class these people have been noted for their pluck, industry and accumulative 
methods, and their love for home and community makes them citizens par 
excellence. 

Mr. Beckman is a man who needs no introduction to the citizens of Lake 
county in mercantile and ]iolitical circles. He is a native of Hanover town- 
ship, Lake county, where he was born October 26, 1856. He is the eldest 
of nine children, three sons and six daughters, born to Herman C. and 
Elizabeth (Fink) Beckman, and eight of them are still living. Gesina M. 
is the wife of Dr. A. Groman, of Odebolt, Iowa, and their son, Herman C., 
is a graduate, with honors, in the class of 1904 from Yale University; 'Sirs. 
Groman was educated in the common schools and by individual study and 
application. Elizabeth K. is the wife of William H. Rohe, a banker and 
druggist of Crete, Illinois. Anna M. is the wife of H. H. Gansbergen, a 
music publisher, with Root and Company of Chicago. Hermina, a lady of 
charming and lovely character and disposition, is a bookkeeper with E. F. 
Root and Son of Chicago. Margaret J- is the wife of Charles J. Murphy, 
who is a farmer and stock dealer. Herman C, who is niarried and a resident 
of Chicago, is in the employ of the DeLaval Separator Company. B. Fred- 
erick, who is married and a resident of Red Oak, Iowa, is road master of the 
C, B. & O. Railroad. 

Father Beckman was born in Hanover, Germany, June 3. 1822, and died 
July 5, 1894. He was reared to young manhood in his native land, and 
gained his education by personal application and by reading the newspapers. 
He was a man of more than ordinary intelligence, and in the later years of 
his life he corresponded for some agricultural papers. He bade adieu to his 
native land and came to America to cast in his lot among a strange people and 
with not a great deal of cash on hand. It was about 1846 when he came to 
New York, and he remained there until 1856. He spent a short time in South 
Carolina, and in May, 1856, he arrived in Lake county. He began the mer- 
cantile business at Hanover Center, and also the breeding of high-grade 
cattle. Most of his life in Lake county was spent in merchandising. He 
was an ardent Repulilican, and prior to the formation of that party was a 
Whig, and was a warm admirer of Lincoln, Blaine and Garfield. Frater- 
nallv he was a member of the Masons and the Odd Fellows. His wife and 



694 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tlie mother of Mr. Becknian was born in the ])rovince of Hanover, Germany, 
August 14, 1835, and she died in July. 1879. 

Mr. Beckman was reared and educated in his native county of Lake. 
He was educated in the common schools and at T. H. Ball's Institute and at 
Bryant and Stratton's Business College. His early life was spent on the 
farm. Mr. Beckman is one of the cordial gentlemen who are popular with 
both the masses and the classes, and by his courtesy and genial manner he has 
won the confidence of the people of Lake county, and has played a conspicuous 
part in the political arena. 

November 3, 1880, he married Miss Mary A. Echterling, and twelve 
children have been born to them, six of whom are living. The eldest, John 
F., is at the present writing in the model dairy of the agricultural department 
of the World's Fair at St. Louis. He was educated in the common schools 
and at Crown Point, and took four years at Purdue L'niversity, graduating in 
the class of 1904. August C. is a civil engineer in northern Wisconsin in 
the employ of the C. & N. W. Railroad. He was also educated at Purdue 
University, graduating in 1904. Elenora M. is in the public schools, as are 
also Marie T. and Frederick Herman, and William Edgar is the youngest 
of the family. 

Mrs. Beckman was born in the province of ^^'estphalia, Germany, May 
14, 1858, being a daughter of Frederick and Mary A. (Cloidt) Echterling. 
She was educated in the German and English languages, and is a member of 
the Roman Catholic church. Mr. Beckman has always espoused the princi- 
ples of the Republican party, and cast his first presidential vote for James A. 
Garfield. 

Mr. Beckman is a lover of his county, state and nation, and has always 
had the good of his county at heart. He received the nomination for the 
office of county auditor in 1892. Init was defeated by the Democratic land- 
slide of that year. In 1900 he was elected joint representative of Lake 
county, and each year since, including the present year, has been chosen to 
that important office. Fraternally he is a member of the Independent Order 
of Foresters and also of the Knights of Pythias. He is now to a great extent 
retired from business. We are pleased to present this brief text of this worthy 
gentleman who has spent his entire life in Lake county, to form an enduring 
record in the Encyclopedia of Genealogy of Lake county. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. _ 595 

FRED W. BUCKLEY. 

Fred W. Buckley, formerly manager for the Wilbur Lumber Company 
of Lowell, was born in Cedar Creek township. Lake county, Indiana. March 
2, 1878, his parents being William and Elizabeth (Darst) Buckley, who were 
early settlers of Lake county. The father is now living a retired life in 
Lowell. 

Upon the home farm Fred W. Buckley spent the first sixteen years of 
his life, and during that period acquired his education in the public schools, 
which he attended during the winter months. He then began work for the 
Lowell Lumber Company. John E. Burns being the owner of the yards, and 
in that employ Mr. Buckley remained until May 5, 1898, when the yard was 
sold to the Wilbur Lumber Company, Mr. Buckley continuing there until 
February, 1901. He then resigned and joined his former employer, Mr. 
Burns, in Chicago, and continued with him for three months, at the end of 
wliich time he was offered the management of the \Vilbur Lumber Company. 
He was then but twenty-two years of age, but he had demonstrated his 
superior ability, his thorough understanding of the lumber trade and his 
trustworthin£Ss, and thus his strong qualities gained him a very desirable 
position, which he held for three years, at the end of which time he again re- 
signed to accept a better position offered by the Sheridan Brick Works. 
Brazil. Indiana. 

On the 19th of July, 1900, Mr. Buckley was united in marriage to Miss 
Lotus Metcalf. who died on the 15th of November, 1901. He is a prominent 
member of the Knights of Pythias fraternity at Lowell and is a man well 
known in Lake county, where he has a large circle of friends, among whom 
he is very popular, owing to his genial disposition, unfaltering courtesy and 
high personal worth. 

BYRON M. CHENEY. 

Byron M. Cheney, who is engaged in fhe practice of law and occupies 
the position of justice of the peace in East Chicago, ranks among the rep- 
resentative residents of that place, where he has so directed his energies as 
to win substantia! success in business and at the same time gain the respect 
and confidence of those with whom he has been associated. As a public 
official he has made a creditable record, his course being marked by the utmost 



59() HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

fidelity to duty, while his decisions are characterized by strict impartiality and 
fairness. 

Mr. Cheney is a native son of Illinois, his birth having occurred in 
Jersey ville, Jersey county, on the 2nd of September, 1840. He comes of a 
family of English lineage and his ancestors were among the passengers of 
the Mayflower, who made the first settlement in New England. The paternal 
grandfather, Prentiss Dana Cheney, was a native of Vermont and a physician 
by profession. He served his countrj^ in the war of 1812. participating in 
the battle of Lake Champlain, and aided largely in the care of the wounded. 
He was twice married, first wedding Miss Murray, by whom he had five 
children, while his second wife was a Miss Goodell. Dr. Cheney reached a 
very advanced age, dying full of years and honors. 

Murray Cheney, son of Dr. Prentiss D. Cheney, was born in the Green 
Mountain state and became a member of the bar. Establishing his home in 
Illinois, he engaged in the practice of law in Jersey county and also held the 
office of sherifif there for two terms. It was in the year 1833 that he left his 
home in New England for the central west, taking- up his abode at what was 
then called Hickoiy Gro^•e. but is now the site of Jerseyville. He afterward 
entered some land in Sangamon county, Illinois, in 1852, and this is still in 
possession of his children. In 1857 he removed to that county, locating upon 
his farm (the Blue ]\Iound) in Talkington township, near Springfield, where 
he carried on agricultural pursuits until the fall of 1861. He then remo\'ed 
to Virden, Illinois, where he resided until bis death, which occurred in 1885, 
when he was seventy-six years of age. In early manhood he wedded Miss 
Caroline Pickett, also a native of Vermont and a daughter of Gilead Pickett, 
who was born in the same state and was of English lineage. He was a black- 
smith by trade, served his country in the war of 1812 and died when well ad- 
vanced in years. In his family were seven children, including Mrs. Cheney, who 
survived her husband for a long period and passed away on the 6th of July, 
1903. when more than ninety years of age. Both were members of the Mis- 
sionary Baptist church and j\Ir. Cheney had served his counti"y as a soldier in 
the Mexican war. They were the parents of eight children, five sons and three 
daughters, of whom five are now living : Gilead P., a resident of Jerseyville, 
Illinois; Byron M. ; Martha C, the wife of Oliver S. Green, of Chicago, Illi- 
nois: John George, of Lyons, Colorado; and William, of Virden, Illinois. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 597 

Judge Byron M. Cheney spent the first fifteen years of his Hfc in Jersev- 
ville, Illinois, and from the age of six years attended the public schools. 
Later he worked upon a farm and afterward engaged in railroad contracting 
and levee work on the Illinois river. In 1888 he arrived in East Chicago and 
estalilished a coal and lime yard. The following year he was elected justice 
of the ])eace and has continuously filled the position since that time, with the 
exception of one term. As a business man he has ever been found reliable 
and trustworthy, manifesting also the progressive spirit of the age. and in 
office he is known for his fearless performance of his duty and his promptness 
and fidelity in the discharge of every task which devolves upon him. 

On the 22nd of February. 1865, occurred the marriage of Judge Cheney 
and Miss Sarah. Beatty, a daughter of Francis and Jane Beatty, but in the 
following March the Judge was called upon to mourn the loss of his young 
wife. Several years later he married Miss Mary Van Zandt, a daughter of 
John and Anna (Barber) Van Zandt. Mrs. Cheney's grandfather, John 
Van Zandt, was in the war of the Revolution, having- entered the ranks when 
only 12 years of age. She is a member of the Methodist church and an 
estimable lady who, like her husband, shares in the warm regard of her many 
friends. Judge Cheney belongs to the JNIasonic fraternity and has attained 
the Royal Arch degree. Politically he is a Republican, earnest in his advo- 
cacy of the principles of the party, and he served as school trustee in Sanga- 
mon county, Illinois, for a long period. He and his wife now reside at No. 
4815 Olcott a\'enue in East Chicago, where he owns a good home, and in 
addition to this he lias two oth.er desiralile lots in East Chicago, and a part 
of the old homestead farm in Sangamon county, Illinois. His life has been 
one of continuous acti\-ity, in which has been accorded due recognition of 
labor; and to-day he is numbered among the substantial citizens of the 
countv. His interests are thoroughly identified with those of the middle 
west and at all times he is ready to lend his aid and co-operation to any 
mo\'ement calculated to benefit this section of the country or ad\'ance its won- 
derful development. 

CHARLES J. HOLMES. 

Among the good and worthy citizens of West Creek township is Mr. 
C. J. Holmes, who is held in high esteem by all who know him. His active 



598 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

careei '.n nortliern Indiana has extended over a period of nearly thirt\' years, 
and lias been one of absorbing indnstry and puljlic-spirited citizenshi]), snch 
as to eventuate in material prosperity and a position of honor among his 
fellow citizens. He hails from the little kingdom of Sweden, where he was 
born June ii, 1854, being the third in a family of eight children, two sons 
and six daughters, born to John and Anna (Swanson) Johnson. The reason 
that Mr. Holmes has a name so different from that of his parents is that, while 
lie was serving as a soldier in the Swedish army, his number was 313. the 
corresponding name to which number was Charles J. Holmes, and Ijy this 
name thus applied he has been known ever since. He has a sister and a 
brother yet living, his sister, Christine, older than himself, being the wife of 
Oscar Petersen, a carpenter and joiner residing in Sweden, and his brother 
Peter being on a ranch at Salina, Kansas. The father of this family passed 
his life in Sweden, and was a shoemaker I>y trade. He also served in the 
military of his country. He and his wife were members of the Lutheran 
church, and they are now both deceased. 

Mr. Holmes was born in the province of Smolen, and received his edu- 
cation in the schools of his native land. He learned the trade of shoemaker 
from his father, and remained with his parents until he was twenty-one years 
old. .-Xt that age he concluded to come to America to better his fortune, and 
on April 28, 1875, ^^ sailed from Gothenburg and landed in Philadelphia 
with just seven dollars in cash capital to support him while he gained a start 
in a foreign land. From Philadelphia he came to Chicago, and three weeks 
later went to an uncle of his in Porter county, Indiana, where a farmer pro- 
cured his services at a wage of thirteen dollars a month. After three months 
he hired out to another farmer at seventy-five dollars a year, and worked for 
this employer for eighteen months. During the ne.xt eighteen months he re- 
ceived twenty-one dollars a month, and his prosperity was soon assured, for 
his diligence and intelligent management of all the interests intrusted to his 
charge soon won him the confidence of all with whom he had dealings, and 
he was before long on the independent road to success. 

On October 5, 1881, he wedded an estimable lady. Miss Emma Ryden, 
and eight children were born of this marriage, seven of them being living, as 
follows: 01i\'er, who received his diploma from the jjublic schools on Feb- 
ruary 19, 1898, and was later graduated froiu the business college at North 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 59^ 

Park, Chicago, and tlie academy at tlie same locality, is now engaged as a 
clerk in one of the banks of Mr. Murray Turner at Hammond ; Emily, who 
received her diploma of graduation from the public schools on May q. 1902. 
at present has charge of her father's home ; Grace is now in the first year of 
the high schocil ; Harry graduated fnnn the common schools on May 12. 1904, 
when (jnly thirteen vears of age : George is in the eighth grade of school work ; 
Bertha is in the sixth grade ; and Esther is in the third grade. 

Mrs. Holmes was born in Smolen. Sweden, March 2J, 1863. being a 
daughter of .\ndrew and Lovisa (Johnson) Swanson, both of whom are now 
living in Porter countv. Indiana, and one sister is also living. Her parents 
are both Lutherans, and her father had served in the Swedish army. She 
was eight years of age when she accompanied lier parents to America, the 
home lieing established in Chesterton, Porter county. She was educated in 
both the Swedish and English languages. She was a woman of noble char- 
acter and an able assistant to her husband in the rearing of her children and 
the caring for the home. Her disposition was all gentleness and kindliness 
toward all. and she made friends where\'er she went. She was a memlier of 
the Lutheran church at Chesterton. This good woman passed away from 
the world and her sorrowing family on February 24, 1901, and her remains 
are interred in the Chesterton cemetery. She was a loving and affectionate 
wife and mother, and her admonitions and advice to her children have sunk 
deeply and permanently into their hearts and become part and parcel of their 
worthy characters. Mr. Holmes is now living in West Creek township with 
his children around him. and his noble daughter Emily assumes complete 
management of the home. Too much cannot be said of this good man and 
worthy citizen of West Creek township, and he has friends by the score. 
Ever since coming to this country and assuming the active duties of citizen- 
ship he has been a stanch upholder of Republican principles. He and the 
older children are members of the Lutheran church. 

LEGRAND T. MEYER. 

LeGrand T. Meyer, who has been a leading attorney at law in Ham- 
mond for over ten years, is a life-long resident of Lake county, and has 
worked out his successful career almost within call of his first home. He 
has been a member of the bar of the county for the past fifteen years, but did 



GOO HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

not at once engage in active practice, continuing iiis legal and literary 
studies until his graduation in 1892. He has for several years been prom- 
inent in the business as well as professional activity of the city, and is to be 
counted among the truly representative and public-spirited citizenship of 
Hammond. 

Mr. Meyer was born in Crown Point, Indiana, November 22, 1867. 
His father, John H. Meyer, was born in Hanover. Germany, son of a life- 
long resident of that province. He was reared in Germany, and in 1855 emi- 
grated to America. He lived in Brunswick, Indiana, until his enlistment, 
in 1861, in Company B, Twentieth Indiana Infantry, with which he served 
three and a half years as a private. He was wounded at the second day of 
Gettysburg, and sent to the hospital, but afterward rejoined his regiment. 
He was also in the second battle of Bull Run, at Chancellorsville, and 
throughout the hard Wilderness campaign. After the war he conducted a 
general store at Crown Point for a number of years, and then retired to his 
farm at Cedar Lake. John H. Meyer, the father, died on September 20, 
1904. after a few days' illness from pneumonia, and on September 23, 1904, 
\vas buried in the family lot in Crown Point by a large gathering of his 
old comrades and neighbors. In politics he was an uncompromising Demo- 
crat, and his wife is a member of the Methodist church. He married Mar- 
garet E. Dittmer, who was liorn in Savannah, Georgia, a daughter of Will- 
iam Henry and Sarah Elizabeth (Carr) Dittmer. Her father came from 
Germany and settled at Savannah before the Civil war. He owned con- 
siderable real estate there, was a prosperous merchant, and erected grist 
mills in various localities. In 1857 he came to Lake county, Indiana, and 
Ixiught a farm at Cedar Lake, but afterward returned to Savannah, where 
he died at the age of sixty-six. Mr. and ]Mrs. John H. Meyer had three 
children : LeGrand T., Howard C. and Horace G. 

Mr. L. T. Meyer lived in Crown Point the first eleven years of his 
life, and received his first schooling there. He li\'e(l mi the home farm at 
Cedar Lake for some years, and studied law and continued his literary 
training in his home county. He was admitted to the bar in 1889, and in 
1892 graduated from the literary deiaartment of the University of Michi- 
gan, at Ann Arbor, where he had also taken a law course. He opened his 
office in Hammond in 1892, and has built up a \ery satisfactory practice 



I 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 601 

in the intervening years. He is vice president and one of the cHrectors of 
the Champion Potato JNIachinery Company, which mannfactures potato 
planters and diggers. He gives his poHtical allegiance to the Democratic 
party. His wife is a member of the Baptist church. He resides at 47 Doty 
street, where he built his home in 1896. Mr. Meyer was elected city attor- 
ney of Hammond, on June 21. 1904. He has always taken an active part 
in politics, having several times been chairman of the Democratic city cen- 
tral committee, and has invariably been successful. In 1893 Governor Claude 
Matthews appointed him chief of the engineer corps of the Indiana National 
Guard, with rank of colonel, and during the tempestuous time of Roby 
pugilism and railway riots he was in sen-ice as tlie confidential adviser of 
the governor. Pre\iously to this Mr. i\Ieyer had always been active in mili- 
tary affairs, having commanded a company of Sons of Veterans infantry, 
and had been an active Son of Veteran of the State, holding many state 
offices therein. 

May 22, 1895, Mr. Meyer married Miss Sarah L. Jennings, the daugh- 
ter of William and Adelaide (Miller) Jennings. They have three children, 
Helen Margaret. Laura M., and LeGrand T., Jr. Through the maternal side 
Mr. Meyer traces his direct ancestry to the \\'illiani Carrs of South Caro- 
lina, who took an active part in the Revolutionary war of .American In- 
dependence. 

OLIVER G. WHEELER. 

Prominent among the energetic, enterprising ano successful business 
men of Crown Point, Indiana, is numbered 01i\er G. Wheeler, who is con- 
ducting a dry-goods store in that city. His business career will bear the 
light of strong investigation, and throughout the community where he makes 
his home he is held in high regard because of his active, useful and up- 
right life. 

He was born in Florence, Erie county. Ohio. March 4, 1842. and in 
the paternal line comes of English ancestr}-, although the family was estab- 
lished in .\merica at an early period in the de\elopment of this countrw The 
paternal grandfather was a native of Connecticut, and it was in that state 
that Johnson \\"heeler, the father, was born and reared. He removed to 
Ohio during the pioneer epoch in the history of that state, settling" in Erie 



602 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 



county, wlience he came to Lake county. Lidiana, in 1847, establisliing his 
home in tlie southern part of the county. He was a civil engineer and sur- 
veyor by profession, and did work in that hne throughout northwestern In- 
diana. For a long period he served as county surveyor, and he surveyed the 
larger part of Lake county. His activity, however, extended to other lines 
of business, and he carried on Ixith farming and merchandising interests, his 
efforts contributing to the business development and substantial commercial 
growth of his portion of the state. He died when seventy-two years of age, 
honored and respected by all for what he had accomplished and for what he did 
in behalf of his fellow men. He gave his political allegiance to the Whig 
party in early manhood, and upon the organization of the Republican party 
joined its ranks. He held membership in the Universalist church. He mar- 
ried Sallie Burr, a native of Connecticut, who died in Crown Point when 
fifty-four years of age. They were the parents of ten children, four sons 
and six daughters, se\'en of whom reached years of maturity, while four 
are now living, three daughters and one son. 

Oliver G. Wheeler, the ninth child of the family, was only five years 
of age when he came to Indiana. -His education was acquired in the dis- 
trict schools until he reached the age of fifteen years, when the family re- 
moved to Crown Point, and he then continued his studies there. He entered 
upon his business career as a clerk in his father's mercantile establishment, 
and he was thus employed until after the inauguration of the Civil war, 
when he enlisted in Company A, Seventy-third Indiana Volunteer Infantry, 
in August, 1862. He joined the army as a private, but was promoted to 
the rank of orderly sergeant and afterward to second lieutenant. He served 
for alxDut three years or until the cessation of hostilities in 1865. His first 
battles were at Perryville and Stone River. The command, known as 
Colonel Straight's Provisional Brigade, then consisting of fifteen hundred 
men, passing through North Alabama on the way to Rome in Georgia, 
overtaken by Forrest's men at dusk in the passes of Sand mountain and 
fighting there for three hours, April 30, 1863, repulsing an attack of three 
thousand cavalry, surrendered on the 2d of May, at Blount's Farm in Ala- 
bama. This expedition is known as Straight's raid. Brewer, a historian 
of Alabama, says of the three hours of night battle, "The scene of this pro- 
longed and desperate conflict on the barren mountain heights of north 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 003 

Alabama is remeniliered by participants * * * ^jg one of peculiar, 
weird grandeur, impossible to paint witb words." Tiie men of the Seventy- 
third were exchanged at Richmond, and Mr. Wheeler went home on fur- 
lough. He soon returned, joined his regiment at Indianapolis, and went 
south, again, to Nashville and to Decatur in Alabama, taking part in tlic 
battles at Athens, at Decatur, and at Nashville. At the close of the war he 
receivetl an honorable discharge at Indianapolis in July, 1865. He never 
faltered in the performance of any task assigned to him, but did his full 
duty as a soldier, his military career being a credit to the army. 

Returning to Crown Point, Mr. Wheeler has since been identified with 
business interests iiere. In 1867 he opened a hardware store which he 
conducted successfully and continuously until 1896. In that year he sold his 
stock of hardware and opened his present store, dealing in dry-goods, boots 
and shoes and clothing. His business methods are in keeping with the mod- 
ern progressive spirit of the times, and his earnest desire to please his patrons, 
his honorable dealings and his reasonable prices have secured to him a trade 
that makes his enterprise a profitable one. 

In 1870 Mr. Wheeler was united in marriage to Miss Alice Clark, a 
granddaughter of Judge William Clark. She was born in Crown Point and 
was educated in the public schools. Four children have been born of this 
union, three daughters and a son : Maud, a very promising, talented and 
truly handsome girl, who lived to be fifteen years of age and died at Ash- 
ville. North Carolina; Myra, at home; Ned J., who is a teacher in Purdue 
Uni\-ersity, giving instruction in the mechanical engineering department ; 
and Gretchen Hope. 

Mr. Wheeler is a member of John Wheeler Post No. 149, G. A. R., in 
which he has filled a number of positions. This post was named in honor 
of Colonel John Wheeler, a brother of Mr. W'heeler, who was killed at Get- 
tysburg. Mr. Wheeler is also identified with the Masonic fraternity at 
Crown Point, and he has been a life-long Republican. Almost his entire life 
has been passed here, and those who know him — and his acquaintance is 
wide — recognize in him a loyal citizen, a reliable business man and a faith- 
ful friend. His salient characteristics ha\-e ever been such as to Cduimend 
!iim to the confidence and good will of all, and it is therefore with ])leasure 
that we present the record of his career to our readers. 



604 HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 

Of the "English ancestry" of Mr. Wheeler there are cnly uncertain tra- 
ditions, as is the case with other old New England families, but it is certain 
that John Wheeler settled in Concord before 1640, and removed to Fair- 
field, Connecticut, in 1644: also that a son of this early resident of New Eng- 
land, another John Wheeler, joined a colony for the settlement of Woodbury 
on the east of the Housatonic river, of which colony he was a prominent 
member and had a large family. He died in 1704. His youngest son, a 
third John Wheeler, was born in 1684. He had a son, Samuel \\nieeler, 
born in 1712, and a grandson, Johnson Wheeler, born in 1754. This grand- 
son of the third John Wheeler had a son. Johnson W'heeler, born in 1797. 
w^ho was the father of O. G. AAHieeler of this sketch, so that between him and 
the unknown English ancestry are six generations, two ancestors bearing the 
name of Johnson, one the name of Samuel, and three having the noted Eng- 
lish and also Bible name of John. 

"The Wheelers of New England were a hardy, robust set of men." 
Members of the earlier and more aristocratic families often referred to their 
English family escutcheon. Evidently the Lake county Wheeler families 
came of a good English lineage. 

Inheriting the benefits of such ancestry, descendants also through tlieir 
gifted mother of the prominent Clark and Farwell families of pioneer days, 
Miss Myra Wheeler is justly prized for her excellent qualities in home life. 
in society and as assistant to her father in his business: and the now young 
school girl, Gretchen Hope, is a bright beam of life and joy within her 
father's home. 

JAMES FRANCIS ROWINS. 

James Francis Rowins. who is prominently identified with the printing 
business in Chicago, is a well known former resident of Lake county, where 
he has spent the greater part of the past thirty years. 

Mr. Rowins was born in Easton. Talbot county, Maryland, August 7. 
1850. being a son of John Rowins and Sarah Benson Rowins. His father 
was a manufacturing jeweler in Easton and owner of milling interests in that 
city, and also owned several large plantations in the neighboring counties. 
Mr. Rnwins" genealogical tree runs back for se\-en or eight generations to 
Irish ancestrv on the father's side and to English and Scotch stock on the 
mother's side. Near relati\-es were engaged on both sides during the late 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. (505 

rebellion, the family interests being in close touch with both the north and 
ihe sottth. 

Mr. Rowins was educated almost entirely in private schools, graduating 
from a Methodist classical institute near Annapolis, the capital of the state. 
In earl}- manhood he began reading medicine, but never completed his prepa- 
ration for that profession since he became interested in the printing business, 
which he has followed almost his entire life, ^h: Rowins first became iden- 
tified with Crown Point as a resident and business man in 1873, and for the 
greater part of the subsequent period has called Lake county his home or been 
within close touch with this part of the state. For several years he was 
connected with the newspaper business in Crown Point, and is well re- 
membered in that city and in other communities of the county, although his 
business interests have for some time been centered in the citv of Chicago. 

In religious views JNIr. Rowins is liberal and is identified actively with 
no church. He is a worker in the Masonic vineyard, and has held the high- 
est official positions in his blue lodge, chapter, council and commandery. At 
the present writing he is at the head of the oldest commandery of Knights 
Templar in the west, a body well and favorably known around the world. 
He is also a prominent oflicer in the largest IMasonic body on the globe — the 
Oriental Consistory of Chicago. 

May 7, 1873, I\Ir. Rowins was married at Crown Point to Miss Jennie 
S. Holton, a daughter of Janna S. Holton and a granddaughter of Solon 
Robinson, the pioneer of Crown Point and Lake county, whose prominence 
in early affairs has often been noted in other portions of this volume. The 
following children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Rowins : Howard Holton, 
born January 21. 1875: James Edward, born ]\Iay 17. 1877. and died Aug- 
ust 17. 1898: Josephine Sarah, born January 10. 1880, and died March 18, 
1903: and Cora Belle, born June 10, 1883. 

F. E. BROWNELL. 

The business interests of Lowell find a worthy representative in F. E. 
Brownell, who is engaged in dealing in agricultural implements there and 
who in the careful management of his business affairs is winning creditable 
.success. He was born in Schoharie coui:ty. New York, on the 24th of 
April, 1852, and comes of Scotch lineage. His paternal grandfather, a na- 



60(3 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

tive of Scotland and the founder of the family in America, crossed the At- 
lantic when a young man and established his home in Pennsylvania. Dr. 
Alva Brownell, the father, was born in Schoharie county. New York. He 
removed to Lake county, Lidiana, settling at Crown Point, where he en- 
gaged in the practice of medicine for two years. He then removed to what 
is now Plum Grove in Eagle Creek township, where he carried on agricul- 
ural pursuits in connection with his professional duties up to the time of his 
death, which occurred in May, 1871, when he was in his sixty-eighth year. 
He was a life-long Republican and took an active interest in public affairs, 
being particularly loyal to the Union cause at the time of the Civil war. He 
held a number of local positions, inchuling those of trustee and justice of 
tlie peace. He was also active in church work and conducted a Sunday- 
school at Plum Grove for many years. His acquaintance in the county was 
wide and favorable, his fellow townsmen recognizing his sterling worth and 
giving him their warm personal regard and friendship. His wife, who 
bore the maiden name of Margaret Sturnburg. was a native of Pennsylvania, 
where she made her home until about twelve years of age, when she ac- 
companied her parents on their removal to Schoharie county. New York. 
Slie was of German descent and parentage and could not speak a word of 
English until alx)ut the time of the removal to the Empire state. Her death 
occurred in Plum grove. Lake county, Indiana, in February, 1855. Dr. and 
Mrs. Brownell were the parents of eight children; five reached adult age. 
but only two are now living, the eldest and the youngest, the brother of 
F. E. being Ezra Brownell, who is a retired farmer living in Madis^'i 
county, Iowa. 

F. E. Brownell, the youngest of the family and the only representative 
left in Lake county, was but four years of age when he came with his parents 
to Crown Point. His education was obtained in Plum Grove, Eagle Creek 
township, and he remained at home through the period of his boyhood and 
youth, and in early manhood took charge of the home farm, continuing 
its cultivation up to the time of his marriage. It was on the second of 
February, 1871, when he was joined in wedlock to Miss Frances Dinwiddle, 
a daughter of John and Mary (Perkins) Dinwiddle, who were early set- 
tlers of Lake county. Mrs. Brownell was born in this county May 9, 1853. 
She was taken as a l>ride to the old Brownell homestead, and her husband 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 60T 

continued to engage in general farming there until 1900. when lie put aside 
the active work of the fields and took up his abode in Lowell, where he 
established an agricultural implement business. He still owns the old home- 
stead property, however, and it is operated under his direct supervision. It 
comprises two hundred and sixty acres of land in Eagle Creek townsliip and 
is a valuable and productive property, which annually brings to him a good 
income. He now carries in Lowell a large and well-selectecl line of agricul- 
tural implements, and has built up a good patronage in his commercial venture. 
To Mr. and Mrs. Brownell have been born ten children : Carl, who is 
living on the old homestead : Alice, the wife of Howard Slocum, of Lowell ; 
John, who is living in Brazil, Indiana: Claude, of Sandwich, Illinois; Kate, 
the wife of Harry Hill, of Joliet. Illinois; Guy and Edward, both of Lowell; 
Ruth, at home; \\'alter and Ralph, who are also under the parental roof. 
All of the children were born in Eagle Creek township. Mr. Brownell has 
ever been a stanch adherent of Republican principles and has taken an active 
part in promoting the welfare and growth of the Republican organization, 
yet has never sought or desired political preferment for himself. He be- 
longs to the Knights of Pythias fraternity at Lowell and is well known 
throughout Lake county, where be has spent almost bis entire life. He has 
been true to every trust reposed in him, has been found honorable and 
straightforward in his business dealings, and lx;cause of his straightforward 
purpose and unflagging energy he has attained a very desirable measure of 
prosperity. 

SEBASTIAN EINSELE. 

Sebastian Einsele, who has done much by bis progressive efiforts for 
the development and industrial welfare of Lake county, and who is a well 
known resident of Hanover township, was born in Baden, Germany, March 
16, 1838, being the fourth of the children born to Michael and Barbara 
(Ferrold) Einsele. His father was bom November 25, 1805, and died in 
1899, and was a wagon-maker by trade. In 1847 l^^ came with his family 
to America, starting from Havre, France, in a sailing vessel, and it was 
forty-three days before they reached New York. Thence he came to Lake 
county, where he purchased eighty acres of partially impnned land in Han- 
over township, and his first home there was a log cabin. He was a prosper- 
ous man, and accumulated about two hundred and twentv acres of land in 



<30S HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Hanover township. Politically he was independent. He aided in the erec- 
tion of St. Martin.s Catholic church at Hanover Center. His good wife 
was also born in the fatherland in 1805. and her death occurred in 1876. 

]\Ir. Einsele was a boy of nine years when he became a resident of this 
county, and he has therefore passed most of his life in the county. He is 
a self-educated man. having gained most of his knowledge by personal ap- 
plication. He remained with his parents until twenty-eiglit years old, and 
when he married and began life for himself he had only two teams, and he 
started to farm on rented land. He continued as a renter for twenty-four 
years in one part of the township, so that it is evident that he began at the 
bottom of the ladder and advanced to his present prosperity by degrees and 
persistent efforts. 

November 16, 1866, he married Miss Katharine Drinen, and ten chil- 
dren were born to them, nine of whom are living. Mary resides with her 
father. Tena is in Chicago, but her home is still with her father. Joseph 
is at home, as also are Michael, Lizzie, Sebastian, Anna, Jacob, Emil. Mrs. 
Einsele was born in Prussia in 1848, and when four years old came to 
America. 

In 1899 Mr. Einsele began the erection of his excellent summer resort 
hotel at Cedar Lake, and since that time he has given his chief atten.tion 
to its management. He has one of the most popular hotels and saloons in 
Cedar Lake, and each summer this resort with its efficient service is thrown 
open to the public, and he is a well known host to the many people who 
each year flock out to this delightful locality. The hotel is about sixty rods 
from the landing and from the Monon depot, so as to Ije most conveniently 
located for the reception of the crowds who, especially on Sunday, throng 
from the city to this pleasure and recreation spot. The Einsele Hotel is 
surrounded by a beautiful natural grove, and with all these charms of situa- 
tion and equipments its popularity each season increases among the Chi- 
cago excursionists. And Mr. Einsele is of the jovial and cordial nature 
which attracts people to him, and his business increases accordingly. He 
has telephone connection with all the towns of Lake county and with Chi- 
cago, and evervthing is at hand to make his guests comfortable and pleased. 
His property there is worth about ten thousand dollars, and within a few 
years the value of the trade and of his permanent investments will rapidly 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. * 609 

increase, as Cedar Lake iDecomes known as it sliould among the vast nnm- 
bers who seek such retired spots for rest and vacation. 

Mr. Einsele is independent in poHtical affairs, and supports whom he 
regards as the 1)est man for tlie office. He and his family are members of 
St. Martins Cathoh'c cliurch at Hanover Center. 

HENRY SEEHAUSEN. 

Henry Seehausen, a prosperous farmer and citizen of Hanover town- 
ship. Lake county, is a native son of the same locahty, and was born April 
2, 1858. being the eldest of the six children, four sons and two daughters, 
of Henry and W'ilhelniina (Glade) Seehausen. The son William is mar- 
ried and a farmer of Hanover township. Fred is married and a farmer of 
Flanover township. Louisa is the wife of William ^^'ille. a farmer of Will 
county, Illinois. .August, married, is a motorman on the Wentworth a\-enue 
electric car line in Chicago. 

Father Seehausen was born in Hanover, Germany, April 7, 1829, and 
died about 1874. He was about twenty-six years of age when he came to 
America, and he had little ca])ital to begin on. He came out to Indiana 
and started as a wage earner. He purchased one hundred and sixteen acres 
of partially improved land, and his first home was a little frame structure. 
He went in debt for most of the property, but by. diligence lifted the in- 
cumbrance and added to his estate until at his death he was possessed of 
two hundred and fifty-four acres, all in Hanover township. He was a Re- 
publican, and he and his wife were members of the Lutheran church. His 
wife was born in Hanover township. July 27, 1839. and she is still living 
at the age of sixty-five years. 

Mr. Seehausen was born and reared in Hanover township, and was 

educated in both the German and English languages. March 9, 1884, he 

married Miss Anna Seegers. and seven children have been born, six of 

whom are living. August F., who completed the seventh grade of school. 

is farming at home. Rosa, at home, finished the seventh grade in school and 

in a German school took musical instruction. Ella, who was in the sixth 

grade, is now in the German school. Albert is in the fourth grade. Edna is 

in the second, and William is the baby of the family. August and Rosa have 

both received their confirmations. 
39 



GIO ■ HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mrs. Seehausen was bom in Hanover township, Marcli 20, 1866, being 
a daughter of Christopher and Dorothea (Koehhng) Seegers. There were 
eight children in the family, three sons and five daughters, and of the three 
living Mrs. Seehausen is the oldest. Her sister ]\Iary is the wife of Fred 
Seehausen, a farmer of Hanover township, and Sophia is the wife of Fred 
Hitzeman, a farmer of Hanover township. Father Seegers was Ijorn in Han- 
over province, Germany, in 1821, and died in 1880. He was reared, edu- 
cated and married in Germany, and was a wea\-er by trade. He came to 
Lake county about 1847, ^"^1 had about sixty acres of land in Hanover 
township. He and his wife were Lutherans, and he was a Republican. His 
-wife was born in Hanover, Germany, about 1830, and is still living. Mrs. 
Seehausen was educated in both the English and German, and she has been 
a faithful wife and has aided her huslxind in the establishment of their 
pretty home. 

Mr. and Mrs. Seehausen began their married life on the old homestead, 
he buying out the other heirs to the estates, and although he went in debt 
in the end he paid off all that he owed and now has one of the best farms 
and homesteads in Hanover township. He has one hundred acres of fine 
land, and it is well improved with buildings and all things necessary for 
its successful and profitable operation. He has a splendid lot of stock, and is 
particularly proud of his Poland China hogs, which he regards as the most 
profitable breed. He is a stockholder in the Inter-State Creamery, which 
is a prosperous enterprise. 

Mr. Seehausen is a Republican, having cast his first presidential vote for 
James A. Garfield. He has not cared for office, and his full time has been 
devoted to his private business and domestic affairs. He and his good wife 
are members of the Lutheran church located in the northwestern part of 
the township, and their daughter is organist in the church, and all the 
children attend the Sunday school. 

JOHN HENRY MEYER. 

John Henry Meyer, who is one of the oldest and most prosperous 
farmers of Hanover township, was born in Hanover, Germany, September 
21, 1833, being the oldest of four children, two sons and two daughters, born 
to John H. and Maggie (Beckman) Meyer. Only two survive, his brother 
John being a wealthy retired farmer of Crown Point. 




JOHN H. MEYER 



4 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 611 

The father of this family was born and reared in Hanover, Germany, 
being educated in the German schools and following; the occupation of 
farmer. He married in Germany and all the children were born there. In 
185 1 he and his family sailed from Bremen, and forty-two davs later ar- 
rived in New York. The parents and one of their children went to Savannah, 
Georgia, for the winter, but the other three remained in New York. In the 
spring of 1852 the parents started for the west with the intention of locating 
either at Fort Wayne, Indiana, or in Iowa, but on the death of a brother 
who had taken up land in Lake county they came to this county and pur- 
chased two hundred acres of land near the western corner of Cedar Lake. 
The father added to his possessions until at his death he owned three hun- 
dred acres of good land. The first home of the Meyers was a log cabin, 
and deer and wob.es were still to be seen in the neighborhocd. The father 
voted for Fremont, the first Republican nominee, and he and his wife, who 
was a native of the same locality in Germany as himself, were members of 
the Lutheran church. 

Mr. Meyer was a young man when he became a resident of the United 
States, and during his first winter in this country he clerked in a store in 
New York. Coming to Lake county in the spring of 1852, he began on the 
farm and has remained a tiller of the soil all his life. He was educated in 
both the German and English languages. 

He remained with his parents to the age of twenty-seven, when, on 
January 20, 1861, he was married to Miss Christena Doescher, by which 
union twelve children have been born, all of whom are living. Johanna is 
the wife of John E. Meyers, a merchant of Kinman, Jasper county, In- 
diana. Henr}' is married and is a contractor and builder at Mexico. ^lis- 
souri. John is married and a resident of Kansas City. Kansas. August, 
married, is a dealer in and a manufacturer of harness at Mexico. Missouri. 
Emma is the \\ife of August Grabe, a professional horseshoer of Chicago. 
Lizzie is at home with her parents. Christena is in Chicago. Anna is in 
Chicago. Julius is a resident of Independence. Missouri. Edwin, a prac- 
tical farmer and stockman in Hanover township, had a common school edu- 
cation and then took a business course at Valparaiso, where he graduated in 
1896; he is a Republican and cast his first vote for McKinley. Adolph, who 
took the commercial and shorthand course at ^^alparaiso. graduating in 



012 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

1900, is now in the wholesale house of Carson, Pirie, Scott & Company, 
at Chicago. Ernest, also a student at Valparaiso, is at home. 

Airs. Meyer was born in Hanover, Germany, November 8, 1841, a 
daughter of Herman and Johanna (Sleffens) Doescher, who were the par- 
ents of eight children, two sons and six daughters, five of whom are living. 
Herman, the eldest, is married and is a farmer in Endor, Illinois. Johanna, 
of Endor, Illinois, is the widow of Christopher Batterman. Fredericka is 
the widow of Charles Horn, a resident of Crete. Illinois. Mrs. Meyer is 
next. Charles, who was a soldier in the Civil war, is married and a resident 
of Crete, Illinois. 

When Mr. and Mrs. Meyer began life it was as renters on section 19 in 
Hanover township, and for six years they farmed on rented land. The first 
land he purchased was twn hundred and twenty acres in section 31. and he 
went in debt for a large part of it, luit in the end his diligence and good man- 
agement paid off all the indebtedness, and he is now owner of three hun- 
dred and two acres in Hanover township and fourteen acres in Center town- 
ship, well improved with barns, granaries, and other buildings, and they have 
an excellent farm residence, without a dollar of mortgage standing against 
the property. He is also owner of three hundred and sixty-five acres in 
Audrain county, Missouri, situated only four miles from the thriving city 
of Mexico. 

jMr. Meyer is a Republican, having cast his first presidentwl vote for 
Fremont, since which time each party candidate has received his support. 
He and his wife had seen all the remarkable development of Lake county 
during the last half century, and they are therefore among the real old- 
timers, and held in the highest esteem for their many excellent qualities of 
mind and heart. 

REV. :mathias zumbuelte. 

The clergy of the Roman Catholic church, as a rule, are gentlemen of 
ripe scholarship, and are important factors in the civilization of remote dis- 
tricts as well as founders of great and beneficent works. They are noted for 
their persistency, energy^ and ambition. Rev. Zumbuelte comes of that class 
of priests. He is a native of Westphalia. Germany, and was born February 
19. 1S39, being a son of Anthony and Elizabeth (Oellinghoff) Zumbuelte. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. til3 

He was from the first of a literary turn of mind, and the priesthood seemed 
to him to be his chosen work. His primary training was begun in the 
common schools of Germany, and later he received training under a tutor. 
At the age of seventeen he entered the gymnasium, which course regularly 
required nine years, but in five years he received his diploma, and then entered 
the seminaiy of the old city of ]\Iunster. where he put in three years at his 
work. The tirst }'ear"s work was in philosophy, and th.e last two in theology. 
When he had completed this course of study he received a cordial letter 
from Bishop Leuers, of the Northern Bishopric of Indiana, who was on 
a visit to Europe and at that -particular time in the city of Munster. Bishop 
Leuers advised him to enter the American College of Theology of the 
famous University of Munster, which he did in 1864, and accordingly spent 
two years in that noted seat of learning. May 26, 1866, he received his 
ordination as priest from the hands of Cardinal E. Sterx. He was then 
fitted to enter the priesthood in America, and he set sail from Bremen and 
arrived at Fort Wayne. Indiana, in Octolier, 1866. and was appointed as- 
sistant priest to Rev. Joseph B. Ferce at St. \'incent"s parish at Logansport. 
He remained there until January 6, 1868. \Miile there his duties were 
arduous, as he had a great deal of mission work to perform, and also visit- 
ing the poor, the sick, the distressed and dying, at all times of the day and 
night, and during any kind of weather. In this Father Zumbuelte showed 
himself to be a man of more than ordinary courage and industiy as his work 
extended over a large area of country. The next work he took charge of was 
as assistant to Rev. D. Duehmig. at Avilla, Noble county, Indiana, and he 
was there six months. In July. 1868, he was sent to Leo, Allen county, In- 
diana, a small parish of nineteen families. The name of the parish was 
St. ]\Iar)-. There was a small frame building used as church — no home for 
the priest, and Father Zumbuelte was forced to live with a farmer for two 
years. He remained there two years in all. and while there he erected a 
nome for the priest. In 1870 he erected St. MichaeFs church at a ccst of tliir- 
teen hundred dollars, and liquidated every dollar's indebtedness and paid 
an additional delit of seven hundred dollars. In 187 1 Father Zumbuelte was 
sent to St. Vincent de Paul at Columbia City, Indiana, and while there kept 
up the property in excellent repair, the parochial school in session and other 
important parish work. In that locality he had two missions to attend to. 



614 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

at Pierceton and W'arsaw in Kosciusko couiit\'. There were about seventy- 
five families in the Columbia City parish. In September, 1875, he was 
called to St. Mary's parish at Crown Point, Ixit remained there only seven 
months, or until April, 1876, when he concluded to visit his native land to 
see his parents and relatives. His father was an old soldier under the great 
Napoleon, and was present at the famous battles of Leipsic, Jkloscow and 
other memorable battles of that epoch. He was one of the cannoniers. 

After spending three months in the land of his birth Father Zumbuelte 
returned to his field of labor in Indiana, and was then sent as chaplain of the 
colleee at Rennselaer, where he remained until 1888, and while there he 
erected a beautiful brick church costing six thousand dollars. In 1888 he again 
paid a visit to his home in Germany, and upon his return he was sent to 
Reynolds, Indiana, and besides this charge he had the missions of Medar}'- 
ville and Francesville. He was there one year, and then, in October, 1889, 
he came to St. Martin's parish in Hanover township, where he has been in 
active charge to the present writing in 1904. There are about sixty-five 
families, a parochial school, a nice church building, and an elegant and mod- 
ern residence erected for the priest in 1902. The value of the entire parish 
property is placed at eight thousand dollars, and not a dollar is standing 
against it. 

On July 9, 1902, Father Zumbuelte met with a severe loss when fire 
destroyed his home and all its contents, including his fine library and all of 
his wearing apparel. But with indomitable will he set to work at once and 
erected a model residence of modern style of architecture, two stories, and 
finished in hard-wood, and containing twelve rooms. It is a beautiful home 
and a credit to the township. The parochial school of St. Martin's jwrish 
comprises forty-three pupils. 

HENRY ASCHE. 

The German citizen in America has been specially important as a factor 
in the development of farming interests, and to this worthy class of people 
l>elongs Mr. Henry Asche, one of the oldest German farmers in Hanover 
township as well as one of the most prosperous. 

Mr. Asche was born in Hanover, Germany. April 21, 1830, a son of 
Frederick Asche. There were onlv three sons, and Henrv is the onlv sur- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 615 

vivor. Father Asche was a man of industrious habits, of German educa- 
tion, and was a soldier in the European war of 1812 against the French, and 
saw the great Xapoleon. He underwent many of the hardships of the war. 

Mr. Asche was reared in his native land to the age of twenty-four, and 
learned the weaver's trade. May i, 1854, he bade adieu to his native land 
and sailed from Bremen in a sailing vessel, and the voyage lasted forty-nine 
days before the arri\-al at New York. He landed in a strange land and 
among a strange people, and could not speak the English tongue, and all 
the money he had was thirty-five dollars. He remained in New York about 
ten months, and then came to Chicago, where he resided for ten years. He 
began as a wage-earner, at twenty-six dollars a month, the next year got 
thirty-four dollars a month, and the next vear forty. In the fall of 1864 
the crisis came when there was no work. During" the vears 1862-63-64 he 
received sixty-five dollars a month, and in 1865 he came to Hanover township 
and purchased seventy-five acres of partially improved land, going in debt 
for part of the purchase price. His first home was a little frame structure, 
and it still stands as a monument of the early days of his entry into this 
township. As the years have passed he and his good wife worked and toiled 
and added to their possessions until now they have two hundred and ten 
acres in Hanover and W'est Creek townships. Since that early day he has 
erected the most comfortable and desirable residence, barns and other build- 
ings to be found in the township, and the premises around the home indicate 
the careful, industrious man which Mr. Asche is. He has prospered greatly 
in his affairs, and now in the evening of life he and his good wife live in 
peace and plenty. Mr. .\sche is one of the stockholders in the Brunswick 
Creamery Company at Brunswick. 

October 2, 1859, he was married in W'ill county, Illinois, to Miss Sophia 
M. Becker, and of the six children, four sons and two daughters, born to 
them, only one is now living, Hermann H. This son was born in Hanover 
township, March 13, 1874, was educated in the English language, and is a 
practical farmer, residing with his father and mother. He is a Republican 
in politics. Thus only one child is left to Mr. and Mrs. Asche in their 
declining years, and they too have had grief and sorrow in their journey 
through life. 

Mrs. Asche was born in the province of Hesse, Germany, May 24, 



616 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

1836, a daughter of H. H. and Elenora Becker. There were ten cliildren 
in the family, and six are Hving, of whom Mrs. Asche is the eldest. John 
Becker is a resident of Chicago and is married. Ella is the wife of Henry 
Moeller, a resident of Minnesota. Henry is married and lives in Hanover 
township. H. Henry Becker is married and a farmer of Iowa. Conrad 
is married and resides in hiwa. Mrs. Asche was reared in Germany until 
she was eighteen years old, and she came to America with her hrother John. 
sailing from Bremen and being forty-two days in crossing the ocean. She 
came to Chicago to her friends and resided there for four years. 

For thirty-nine years have Mr. and Mrs. Asche resided in Hanover 
township, and they are among the best and most prosperous people of the 
township. Mr. Asche is a Republican and has always supported the ticket 
and candidates since his first vote. He has held no ofifice, preferring to 
devote his time to his business interests. Mr. and Mrs. Asche's beautiful 
country seat is one of the most desirable locations in the township, and 
could well be called the "Pleasant View Farm." They are typical German- 
American citizens of sterling worth. Having come to this country poor 
people, by their industry and economy they have gained a competency which 
places them in easy circumstances. 

FRANK N. GAVIT. 

It is a well attested maxim that the greatness of a state lies not in its 
machineiy of government nor e\en in its institutions, but in the sterling 
qualities of its individual citizens, in their capacity for high and unselfish 
effort and their devotion to the public good. Regarded as a citizen, Frank 
N., Ga\'it belongs to that public spirited, useful and helpful type of man 
whose ambitions and desires are centered and directed in those channels 
through which flow the greatest and most permanent good to the greatest 
number, and it is, therefore, consistent with the purpose and plan of this 
work that his record be gix'en among those of the representative men of the 
state. He is now an attornev of Whiting, and his ability classes him with 
the prominent representatives of the bar in northwestern Indiana. He has 
been connected with much important litigation as the representative of 
private interests, and he was also a defender of \\'hiting"s interests in its 
contests with Hammond. In this wav he has become widelv known, and his 





x^< 




i 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 617 

efforts in behalf of the city of his residence were untiring, eff'ective and 
beneficial. 

Mr. Gavit was born in Walsingham, Ontario, Canada, on the 21st of 
October, 1864, and comes of a family of. Irish lineage. Several genera- 
tions ago representatives of the name left Ireland for the new world, becom- 
ing residents of the United States. The paternal grandfather, Albert M. 
Gavit, was born in New London. Connecticut, and was a farmer by occupa- 
tion, following that pursuit throughout his entire life in order to provide for 
his family. His son, Albert A. Gavit, father of Mr. Gavit, was also a 
native of New London, Connecticut, and there spent his boyhood days. 
AMien a young man, however, he accompanied his parents on their removal 
to Canada. He had been reared to the occupation of farming and also 
made it his life work. Leaving the Dominion he went to Oakland county, 
Michigan, where he resided for five years, and then took up his abode in 
Saginaw county, Michigan, where he still makes his home. He was united 
in marriage to Miss Bridget Highland, who is a native of Ireland and was 
brought to America in early girlhood. Mr. and Mrs. Albert Ga^•it occupy 
a pleasant home in Michigan, and the father is now sixty-eight years of 
age, while the mother has reached the age of sixty-one years. They were 
the parents of ten children, eight sons and two daughters, and five of the 
number are now living. 

Frank N. Gavit. the second child and second son of the family, was 
seven years of age when he accompanied his parents on their removal from 
Canada to Michigan. He was educated in the common schools of that 
state and in the Northern Indiana Normal School at Valparaiso, where he 
was graduated. His literary course being completed, he then determined to 
make the practice of law his life work and entered the law department 
of the Northwestern University at Evanston, Illinois, being but twenty-four 
years of age when he was graduated there. He located for practice in Sagi- 
naw, Michigan, where he remained for about two and a half years, and 
then came to Whiting in 1892. Here he has resided continuously since 
and has won some notable successes at the bar. He has enjoyed a large 
private practice and has also served as city attorney and as deputy prosecut- 
ing attorney. He is attorney for the two banks of Whiting and stantls to-day 
as one of the strongest representatives of the Lake county bar. being a strong 



618 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

advocate before the jury and concise in his appeals before the court. He 
is notable among lawyers for the wide research and provident care with 
which he prepares his cases. In no instance has his reading been confined 
to the limitations of the question at issue, and his logical grasp of facts 
and principles and of the law applicable to them has been another potent ele- 
ment in his success, while his remarkable clearness of expression and ade- 
quate and precise diction enables him to make others understand not only 
the salient points of his argument but his every fine gradation in meaning. 

In politics Mr. Gavit is a stanch and unfaltering Republican, and was 
nominated on that ticket for supreme judge in 1896, but lost by a fraction 
of a delegate vote and in 1900 by two delegate votes. At a meeting of the 
bar of Lake county he was endorsed by the bar for the position of circuit 
judge to succeed Judge Fulett. He was at one time candidate for mayor 
of Whiting and was defeated by only two votes. Mr. Gavit drew up the 
incorporation papers for the town of Whiting and afterward incorporated 
it as a citv, and he has represented Whiting in all of the litigations between 
this place and Hammond. 

In 1893 Mr. Gavit was married to Miss Minnie Tweedy, a daughter 
of David and Susan (Baxter) Tweedy. Mrs. Gavit was born, reared and 
educated in Saginaw, Michigan, and this marriage has been blessed with 
two children who are yet living, Albert and Ruth. Fraternally Mr. Gavit 
is a Mason and has attained the Knight Templar degree. As a lawyer and 
progressive citizen he is well known, and Whiting has profited by his ef- 
forts in her behalf. 

MATHIAS M. LAUERMAN. 

Mathias M. Lauerman is so well known as a merchant and business man 
of Hanover township that he needs no introduction to the people of Lake 
county. He is a native of Hanover township, where he was born February 
8, 1854, and is the fourth in a family of ten children, five sons and five 
daughters, born to Mathias and Marie (Heiser) Lauerman. There are 
seven children living. Mary is the wife of Bartel Hepp, a farmer at Flor- 
ence, Montana. Angeline is the widow of Conrad Wagner, and is a landlady 
at Morris, Illinois. ^Mathias M.. is the next. John is married and is a 
farmer at Hanover Center. Mike is married and is a United States mail 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. G19 

carrier at Hammond. Katharine is the wife of Jacob Card, a farmer of 
Hanover township. Elizabeth is the wife of John Stummel. wlio is a teacher 
and a resident of Turkey Creek, this county. 

Alathias Lauerman. the father, was a native of Prussia, Germany, born 
February 8, 1824, and he was reared in the fatherland until he was nine- 
teen years old, being educated in the German tongue. In 1843 '^^ came with 
his parents to America, and the voyage across the ocean consumed sixty days, 
although it can now be accomplished in six days. Landing in a strange land 
and among a strange people and with but little money, he came to Lake county 
with his parents, who purchased one hundred and sixty acres of partially im- 
proved land, going in debt for it, but by diligence and thrift eventually free- 
ing the incumbrance. Mathias Lauerman was a successful man, having ac- 
cumulated one hundred and sixty acres of good land and a nice residence 
near Hanover Center, and he spent most of his life in Hanover township, 
where his death occurred. He was a Democrat in politics. He and his wife 
were devout Catholics, and he was one of the leading members in the erec- 
tion of St. ^Martin's Catholic church, and he always aided those Ijenevolences 
worthy of his consideration. His remains are interred at Hanover Center, 
where a beautiful stone marks his last resting place. Mother Lauerman was 
born in the same province, April 15, 1828, and she is still living at the age 
of seventy-six, with mental faculties well preserved in spite of the more than 
three-quarters of a century of her earthly pilgrimage. 

IMr. Lauerman was reared to the age of twenty-three in his home town- 
ship and was brought up as a farmer. He was educated in the common 
schools and by dint of personal application. February 12, 1879, he married 
Miss Mary Scholl, and seven children, six sons and one daughter, have 
blessed the union. Joseph, the eldest, was educated in the Metropolitan 
Business College of Chicago and is now in the wholesale rubber business in 
Portland, Oregon. Edward is associated with his father in the large and 
lucrative mercantile business at Armour and Cedar Lake, and he will per- 
sonally conduct the new store at Cedar Lake. He was educated in the com- 
mon schools, and through the School of Correspondence passed the examina- 
tion for mail clerk, but he is devoting his life to the mercantile business. 
He has the affability and geniality which is the best stock in trade for a young 
man The son Arthur, after a common school education, learned the barber 



620 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

trade at a Cliicago barljer college, and is ikav at home. Emil is a salesman 
in his father's large store at Armour. He too took his business course at the 
Metropolitan Business College of Chicago. Jerome received his diploma from 
the common schools in the class of 1903, and is now at home with his parents. 
Martha is in the sixth grade and has also taken piano instruction. Victor 
the youngest, is in school. All the children but Martha and Victor ha\e been 
confirmed in the faith of the Catholic church, the confirmation ceremony for 
all having been administered by Bishop Rademacher, now deceased. 

Mrs. Lauerman was born in Schererville, Lake county, March 15, 1856. 
and she was reared, educated and confirmed in this county. After their mar- 
riage Mr. and Mrs. Lauerman located in Sheridan county, Missouri, where 
he purchased forty acres of partially improved land, later added to this land 
until he owned one hundred and twenty acres, and continued to reside there 
for six years. Then on account of sickness he returned to Lake county and 
began work on the Monon Railroad as a wage earner, continuing at that for 
two years. He then Ijegan merchandising at Armour in partnership with 
Mat. Thiel, with a capital of about eight hundred dollars, and after this part- 
nership had continued about fcair weeks Mr. Thiel took sick and died, after 
which Mr. Lauerman continued his business career on his own account. From 
these small beginnings the business has increased to the extensive establish- 
ment which we find in 1904, comprising a large double store, which is known 
as a department store, and carrying a heavy line of fancy and staple dry 
goods, boots, shoes, family and staple groceries, queensware, clothing, and 
in fact all commodities which go to make up a first-class mercantile house. 
The annual trade runs up to a \ery high figure. In the fall of 1904 he erected 
at Cedar Lake a new store in which he placed a full stock of fresh goods, and 
this is the store which is to be managed by his son Edward. This is an ex- 
cellent business record which Mr. Lauerman has made, and in twenty wears' 
time he has progressed from a position of very modest circumstances to a 
foremost place among the substantial business men of Lake county — which 
is a career that any man might be proud of. He and his sons are cordial 
and genial gentlemen, and by fair and courteous treatment they have found 
ample patronage in whatever direction they have extended their trade. 

Mr. Lauerman is a Republican, brit he has never cared for any office, 
and gives all his time to his business. But in 1886 he W2s appointed post- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. G21 

master at Armour. He and his family are members of St. Martin's Catho- 
lic church at Hano\ er Center, and throughout the entire community this fam- 
ily meet the respect and esteem which are always given to people of true 
personal worth and whose lives have accomplished something praiseworthy 
in the world. 

HERMAN A. BATTERMAN. 

The country of Germany has aided most materially in the founding of 
the great nation of the United States, and its citizens have been especially 
prominent factors in the agricultural development which has been the basis 
of all other prosperity. The German-American is noted for his pluck, energy, 
.economy and frugality, and exhibits the best and most productive estates to 
be found anywhere. Mr. Herman A. Batterman comes of one of the old 
German families of west Lake county, and is a true and typical specimen of 
the prosperous agriculturist. 

His early life was spent in Will county, Illinois. Born July 26, 1853, 
he was the oldest of eight children, six sons and two daughters, born to 
Christopher and Johanna (Doescher) Batterman. The son Henry is repre- 
sented elsewhere in this volume. Edward is also one of the honorable men 
whose lives are sketched in this work. Charles is married and engaged in 
cultivating the old home place in Will county, Illinois. Henrietta is the wife 
of Charles Borger, of Hobart, also sketched in this volume. Matilda is the 
wife of Joseph Echterling, of Will county. 

The father of the family was born in Hanover province, Germany, was 
reared to young manhood in his native land, and in 1842 he came by himself 
to America, landing in New York with only eighteen cents in his pocket, so 
that he began life at the bottom of the ladder and among strange people and 
in a foreign land. He came to Chicago in 1842, when that now great city 
was small and insignificant, and out in the neighborhood of the Des Plaines 
river he got work at twel\-e dollars a month, continuing this work for three 
years and three months. He then took his earnings and entered two hundred 
and twenty acres of land in Will county, Illinois, an unimpro\-ed tract. Then 
for a while he did teaming in Chicago, but finally returned to his land and 
erected a little shack of a shelter, and, aided by his brother Fred from Ger- 
many, he developed a farm. For a time he was also interested in a sawmill 



622 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

enterprise, but then returned to the farm. He was a succes,sful man, and ac- 
cumulated ahnost five hundred acres of land in lUinois and Indiana. He was 
a stanch Repubhcan and before the formation of that party he was a Whig. 
He had good reason to rememl^er tlie famous wildcat monej- l^efore the Civil 
war, as on one occasion he had one hundred and thirty dollars of this cur- 
rency, but thirty dollars was all he could realize on the entire amount. Both 
he and his wife were Lutherans. His wife v.as also born in Hanover, and she 
is still living, at the age of sixty-nine years. 

Mr. Batterman was reared to the pursuit of a farmer and stockman, and 
was educated in the common schools and by personal application. At the age 
of twenty-one he began life on a capital of one thousand dollars, starting on 
the farm where he now resides. He purchased three hundred acres and paid 
the one thousand dollars on it, and by his economy and industry in time he 
lifted all incumbrances and the beautiful and high-class buildings and other 
improvements on the estate he has made himself. 

August I, 1875, Mr. Batterman married Miss .\nna Borger, and twelve 
children, six sons and six daughters, have been born to them, seven of whom 
are living. Johanna is the wife of Altert Keun, who is connected with a 
publishing house in Chicago ; Mrs. Keun was educated in the common schools 
and the Hobart high school. Julius, educated in the common schools and at 
the Valparaiso normal, is married and a farmer at Palmer, Indiana. Mag- 
gie, educated in the common schools and at Hobart, is the wife of Michael 
Schmal, a farmer of St. John. Edwin is a resident of Hanover township. 
Herman is in the ninth grade of the Brunswick schools. Alvin is in tlie 
seventh grade, and Elsa is also in school. Mrs. Batterman comes from the 
well known Lake county family of Borgers whose sketch will be found 
elsewhere. 

Mr. Batterman is a lover of high-grade stock, and takes especial in- 
terest in the Percheron horses and the Red Poll cattle, and his cattle of this 
breed are registered, and he also raises fine grades of Chester White hogs. 
During his career he has suffered setbacks and misfortunes, but is a man of 
such determination and energy that he has on each occasion risen phoem'.x- 
like out of the ashes of ill-chance, and is now one of the financially substan- 
tial men of Hanover township. Besides his beautiful and well improved 
estate in Hanover township, he owns nine hundred and fifty acres in Hinds 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 623 

county, Mississippi, five miles northeast of Jackson, the state capital, about 
six hundred acres of this land being arable. The land on the whole is level, 
the location eligible, and as Mr. Batterman thinks the climate there far 
excels that of the northern latitude of Indiana he anticipates locating in that 
vicinity for his future home, — which will mean the loss of a valuable and 
prominent citizen from the ranks of Lake county. Mr. Batterman is a Re- 
publican on national issues, but in local affairs gives his voting support 
to the man best fitted for the office. He cast his first presidential vote for 
R. B. Hayes, and has supported each candidate since. He is a man who 
stands high in the estimation of all his fellow citizens, and has been selected 
to represent his township in the county conventions of his party. In 1898 
he was appointed a member of the county council, and his services have been 
ably and efficiently performed, and he is accordingly tendered the thanks of 
the citizens of the whole county. 

FREDERICK W. MANDERNACH. 

The American nation owes much to the thrifty and hardy virtues of the 
German race, for this class of citizens has lx;en important factors in ad- 
vancing every industrial enterprise. It is to this class that Mr. Frederick 
W. Mandernach belongs, and he has long since proved himself to be one 
of the most prosperous, progressive and public-spirited citizens of Lake 
county and Hanover township in particular. 

Mr. Mandernach was born in the house where he still resides, on Octo- 
ber 15, 1864, and is the youngest of eight children, four sons and four daugh- 
ters, born to John and Tena (Saak) Mandernach. All the children are liv- 
ing. John is married and is living as a retired farmer at Odebolt, Iowa. 
Caroline is the wife of Herman Raasch, a farmer of Odebolt, Iowa. Henry 
is a resident of the same locality in Iowa, and is married. Flora is the 
wife of Gottlieb Nitsche, also in this Iowa community. Louisa is the wife 
of Charles Sauter. a ranchman of Big Springs, Nebraska. Henrietta is the 
wife of Simon Sunderman. horticulturist at Cullman, Alabama. W'illiam, 
of Odebolt, Iowa, is married and is a farmer. And Frederick is the last. 

Father Mandernach is a native of Prussia, where he was torn November 
17, 1817, and is still living at Odebolt, Iowa, retaining the use of his mental 
and physical faculties although at the great age of eighty-seven years. He 



624 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

was about twenty-six years old when he bade adieu to the fatherland and 
came to America, and the voyage was of six months' duration. He came to 
America emptv-handed. not having ten dollars to his name when he arrived. 
In a strange land, among a strange people, whose language he could not 
speak, he had to subsist on the little earnings he could get by daily work. 
He came to Lake county and in Hanover township began as a wage earner, 
and worked for the Rev. T. H. Ball's father at the munificent wage of eight 
dollars per month. He was one of the most energetic and industrious of 
men. The first land he purchased was forty acres, and he traded a pair of 
oxen for it. The first habitation the Mandernachs lived in was a log cabin. 
The father was one of the earliest settlers in western Lake county, and has 
seen deer and wild turkeys on his place. During his early years in the 
county he worked on the first railroad being built to Chicago. He has seen 
Chicago when it was a village in size compared to its present immensity. 
He was a successful man in his active career, and had accumulated seven 
hundred acres of fine land in Sac county. Iowa, and in Hanover town.ship 
of this county. The home residence occupied by ]Mr. and Mrs. Frederick 
Mandernach was erected by his father, and the lumber for its construction 
was brought from Chicago by ox teams. The father was a true Republican. 
He and his wife were members of the German Methodist church two miles 
south of Hanover Center, and he aided very materially in its erection. Even 
the stove in the church was purchased l)y him. Mother ]\Iandernach. a 
native of Lippe, Germany, was born January 13, 1827, and is still living. 

Mr. Mandernach was reared and educated in Hanover township, his 
earl)' mental training being acquirefl in the common schools. He has con- 
tinued a farmer and stockman during his acti\'e career. He remained with 
his parents until he was twenty-one years old, and he and his brother William 
then began as renters on his father's farm. He continued five years as a 
renter, and he then purchased the old homestead in Hanover township, con- 
sisting of one hundred and eighty acres. 

August 6, 1889, he married Miss Matilda E. Piepho, and five children, 
two sons and three daughters, have been torn to them, four of whom are 
living. Elenora A. is in the seventh grade, being a bright student, and has 
also taken piano instruction. Elmer ^^^. in the fifth grade, is well along in 
his studies and takes piano music. Nelson R. and Blanche D. are the 
youngest in the household. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. • 625 

Mrs. Mandeniach was liorn in Kankakee county, Illinois. May 29, 1867, 
a daughter of August and Wilhelmina (Breuscher) Pieplio. There were 
ten children in the' family, and eight are living. Mary, the eldest, is the 
wife of David Dippon, a farmer at Dwight, Illinois. John is married and 
lives on the old homestead in Kankakee county. Emma is the wife of 
Herman Meyer, a farmer of Scotia, Nebraska. Mrs. Mandernach is the 
next. Minnie is the wife of Herman Nichols, a painter at Blue Island, 
Illinois. Louise is the wife of Charles Sauerman, a farmer of Kankakee 
county. George is a prosperous farmer in Hanover township, .\nnie, the 
youngest, is the wife of Ruda Jors, a carpenter at Blue Island. Father 
Piepho was a native of Hanover province, Germany, and was born January 
21, 1833. and died January 13, igoo. He came to America when a boy of 
sixteen or seventeen. He was a shoemaker by trade and at an early day 
had a log-cabin store in Cliicago. He went to the Pacific coast and Cali- 
fornia in 1849, ^^^ dug gold for five years, at which he was very successful, 
bringing back three thousand dollars' worth of the precious metal. He 
went out to the Eldorado countr\' by way of the Isthmus of Panama. The 
first land he purchased in Kankakee county was two hundred and twenty 
acres, antl he bought and sold several times, and at his death he owned 
three hundred acres in that county and two hundred and eighty in Lake 
county, so that he was evidently a very successful man. He was a Repub- 
lican in politics, and he and his wife were members of the German Meth- 
odist church. His remains are interred in the cemetery below Hanover 
Center. The mother of Mrs. Mandernach was born in Little Hanover, 
Germany, December 16, 1842, and is now living with her son George in 
Hanover township. Mrs. Mandernach was a girl of ten years when she 
became a resident of Lake county, and her education was acquired in the 
common schools. She and her husband are very cordial, genial people, 
and have hosts of friends. 

Mr. Mandernach is a Republican, and cast his first vote for Benjamin 
Harrison. Several times he has been selected as a delegate to represent his 
township at county conventions. In 1904 he was elected a trustee of the 
Hanover township, and thus broke a record of some twenty-two years during 
which no Republican had held that office. The people of the township 
recognize in him ?. safe and progressive man of affairs, and his election 

40 



626 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

means that the business and educational achninistration of the township will 
be in good hands during the following term. He is a member of Council 
No. 23 of the Independent Order of Foresters at Brunswick, and he and 
his wife are members of the German Methodist church, of which he is 
a trustee. 

JOHN H. BORGER. 

German-American citizenship lias been an important factor in the 
advance and progress of the state and nation, and one of this worthy class, 
Mr. John H. Borger, is a prosperous resident of Hanover township and a 
true type of the German-z\merican of the twentieth century. Mr. Borger 
was born in West Creek township. Lake county, February 15, 1853, and is 
the eldest of nine children, five sons and four daughters, born to John and 
Metie (Meyer) Borger. There are eight of the family living at the present 
■writing, John H. being the first. Herman is a farmer of Jewell county, 
Kansas. Anna is the wife of Herman Batterman. a prosperous farmer of 
Hanover township. Charles is represented elsewhere in this volume. 
Edward is a farmer of Porter county, Indiana. Johanna is the wife of 
Henry Thineman. a farmer of Porter county. Metie is the wife of James 
CampMl, a resident of LaPorte, Indiana, and a carpenter and joiner by 
trade. Maggie, the youngest, lives in Chicago. 

Father Borger was a native of Hanover province, German}', and was 
I)orn July 22, 1816, and died March 3, 1873. He was reared in his native 
land till manhood, and was educated in the German language. He was 
about thirty years of age when he bade adieu to his native land and sailed 
from Bremen to New York, and the voyage was of several weeks' duration. 
He landed in a strange land, among strange people, and with little money. 
He came at once to Lake county, and began as a wage earner by the day or 
month. The first land he purchased was a small tract in \\'est Creek town- 
ship, and he sold this and purchased one liundred and sixty acres in Hanover 
township, in Sections 30 and 31, and he moved a little log house onto the 
land and this was his first habitation. He was one of the early settlers of 
Lake county, and there were then no roads, and Chicago, the now great city 
of two million, was but a town in size, and he could have purchased land 
around Chicago at a dollar and a half an acre. There was only one railroad 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 627 

across the county at that time. He was a prosperous man, and added forty 
acres more to his real estate in the township. He was a farmer of high 
order and a lover of high grades of stock. He was a stanch Republican and 
always stood firmly on his principles. Mother Borger was a native of Lippe 
province, Prussia, and was born Decemlier i8, 1835, and died February 20, 
1888. Both parents are interred in the Brunswick cemetery, where beautiful 
stones mark their last resting places. 

]\Ir. Borger has been reared and spent all his life in this county, having 
given his attention to farming and stock-raising. He was educated in the 
English language. He remained with his parents until of age, and he con- 
ducted the estate for his mother until his marriage. P'ebruary 14, 1882. 
he married Miss Susan Hoffmann, and ele\-en children, four sons and se\en 
daughters, were born, ten of them lieing alive at this writing. Tillie M., 
the oldest, was educated in the common schools, graduating with the class 
of 1898 from the Brunswick schools. She does very artistic work in silk 
embroidering. Metie S. has completed the seventh grade of common 
schools. John W'., who has passed the seventh grade, is a practical farmer 
boy. Lizzie T. graduated from the Brunswick public schools with the class 
of 1904. Otto H. is in the sixth year work of the schools, Henry E. is in 
the fifth grade, Edward M. is in the fifth grade, Margaret H. is in the third 
year, Luella A. is in the first year, and Clara E. is the baby of the family. 

Mrs. Borger was born in Hanover township. September 15, 1859, a 
daughter of Mike and Susanna (Huppentahl) Hoft'mann. There were 
eight children, five sons and three daughters, in the family, and four of these 
are living, as follows : John, who is a carpenter and resides with his mother 
in Hanover township: Mrs. Borger; Theresa, wife of Anton Hein, a mer- 
chant of Hanover township; and Anton, of Hanover township. Father 
Hoffmann was born in Germany in 1824 and died in 1896. He came to 
America when a young man, having been educated in the German tongue. 
He was a Republican, and a Catholic. His wife was also born in Germany, 
and she is still living at the age of sixty-seven in Hanover township. Mrs. 
Borger was reared in Hanover township and was educated in the common 
schools. 

Mr. and Mrs. Borger began life on the present homestead where they 
now reside, purchasing the shares of the other heirs. All the excellent 



628 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

improvements of the farm have been effected through their efforts, and tlieir 
comfortable farm residence is a credit to the township. Mr. Borger is one 
of the prosperous agriculturists of the township, and is a stockholder in the 
Brunswick Creamery Company, which was established in 1892. He likes 
good stock, and is endeavoring to raise the standard of his own cattle and 
hogs and horses, his favorite breeds of these animals being the Holsteins, 
the Chester Whites and the Normans as a hea\-v draft horse for farmine 
His wife is a fancier of Brown Leghorn chickens. Their estate comprises 
two hundred acres of land in Hanover township, and best of all there is not 
a dollar's indebtedness on the property. Mr. Borger is a stalwart Repub- 
lican, and cast his first vote for R. B. Hayes, having supported each candi- 
date since. Mr. and Airs. Borger and their excellent family are among 
the leading German-American families of Hanover township, and we are 
pleased to give this full history of their lives. It may be added that the 
German spelling of the name Borger is Borger. 

LOUIS \V. HERLITZ. 

The German citizens are the impcjrtant personages who have made the 
wilderness to flower and blossom like the rose in the central Mississippi 
valley. They are noted for their diligence, industry and economy. Mr. 
Herlitz was born in Hanover township. Lake county, in the homestead 
where he now resides. He was born January 22, 1841, and is the third in 
a family of six children, three sons and three daughters, born to Louis E. 
and Gesche (Berger) Herlitz. There are five living. Fred, the eldest, is a 
resident of West Creek township and is a farmer. Margaret, widow of 
Dr. E. W. Vilmer, resides in Crown Point. Mr. Herlitz is next. Mena, 
widow of Fred W'eber, resides in Chicago. Oscar G. is a resident of 
Ross township. 

Father Herlitz was born in the \'illage of Hemann, province of Lippe, 
about the year 1804, and died in 1869. He was reared in his nati\-e land 
until early manhood, when he came to America. He was nine weeks making 
the voyage across the Atlantic, and came to New York, thence to a place 
near Detroit, Michigan, where he remained four years, and where he 
married. He was an agriculturist, and was one of the earliest settlers of 
Lake county, coming here about 1839, when there were a number of Indians 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 629 

here. He purchased eighty acres of wild land, and the first hdme was a log 
cabiiL He was quite successful in life. He was a Republican. Mother 
Herlitz was a nati\-e of Hanover pro\ince, Germany, born not far from 
Bremen atout 1807, and died in 1875. 

Mr. Herlitz is one of the oldest citizens now living who were born 
ni Hanover township. He was educated in the English language and \)y his 
own application. He has been reared as a tiller of the soil. He married 
Miss Anna Meyer A])ril 5. 1877, and eight children ha^■e blessed the union, 
three sons and five daughters, seven of whom are living. Mary, the eldest, 
is one of the successful teachers of the county. She was educated in the 
common schools, and was a graduate in the class of 1900 at Crow-n Point, 
and was a student in Valparaiso normal and has also taken music. Anna M. 
was etlucated in the common schools and at Crown Point high schoiji. She 
has taken instruction in music and is now at home. Julius is at home. 
He has completed the common school course and has also been a student at 
Valparaiso normal. Laura \\'. and William D. are twins. Laura has grad- 
uated from the common schools, and is in her second vear at the Crown 
Point high school, and she has taken instruction in music. William gradu- 
ated in the common schools and is a student at the Crown Point high school. 
Louis F. is in the eighth grade of school. Gesche, in the seventh grade, is 
a bright little girl. 

Mrs. Herlitz was born in Hanover pro\-ince, Germany, February 14, 
1853, and is a daughter of D. H. and Anna (Beckman) Meyer. There 
were five children, two sons and three daughters, in the family. Mrs. 
Herlitz and her In'other Herman, living in Nebraska, are the only survivors. 
Mrs. Herlitz was educated in her nati\'e land, as she was sixteen years of 
age when she came to America, and most of her life has been spent in 
Lake county. 

]\Ir. and Mrs. Herlitz began their married life on the homestead where 
they now reside, and for twenty-seven years, over a c|uarter of a century, 
thev ha^■e lived in Hano\'er townshijj. and are citizens of the highest social 
standing. They ow^n two hundred and five acres of choice land in Hanover 
township, and their beautiful syh'an homestead is a ha\-en of rest for their 
friends as also for strangers. Mr. Herlitz is a Republican. He cast his 
first presidential vote for Lincoln and for each candidate of the party since. 



630 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

He was one of the boys who wore tlie blue, and was a memljer of Com- 
pany D, Eig-hty-tbird Regiment of Indiana Volunteer Infantry, and bis 
regiment was assigned to the Army of the Tennessee under General Sherman. 
He enlisted in October, 1862, and was ten months m service, being in the 
battles of Vicksburg, Arkansas Post and Jackson. Mississippi. He was hon- 
orably discharged August 2. 1863, at Camp Sherman, Mississippi. Mr. 
and Mrs. Herlitz and their excellent family of intelligent children are citizens 
who are among the better class of people of Lake county, and we are pleased 
to present this sketch of this worthy gentleman. 

ALFRED SCHAIAL. 

Alfred Schmal is one of the leading and successful farmers and stock- 
men of Hanover township, and is a gentleman so well known in this part 
of the county as to need no introduction to the readers of this volume. In 
his veins is the blood of the hardy Teutonic race whose sturdy character and 
intelligent industry have been the most important factors in the upbuilding 
of this country, and Lake county has been especially happy to have among 
her inhabitants so many of German birth or parentage. 

Mr. Schmal was born in Hanover township, on the estate where he now 
resides, on September 24, 1863, being the next to the youngest of fourteen 
children, eight sons and six daughters, born to Joseph and Barbara (Keefer) 
Schmal. Nine of these children are yet living, as follows : Katharine, wife 
of Wilhelm Ahles, a carpenter in Hanover township: Mary, widow of Fred 
Gerbing, of Cedar Lake, Indiana; Joseph, married, a blacksmith of St. John; 
Jacob, married, a farmer of St. John ; Barbara, wife of Henry Ebert, a 
farmer of Cedar Creek township; Louie, who is married and is a merchant 
in Chicago: Frank, married and a resident of West Creek township: Aurelia, 
wife of Fred Ebert, a prosperous farmer of Cedar Creek township; 
and Alfred. 

Joseph Schmal. the father, was born in 1819, in Rhenish Prussia, Ger- 
many, and died in January, 1894. He was a young man when he came 
with his parents to America, and he became one of the early settlers of 
Lake county, even when Indians formed a part of the population. He 
attained more than ordinary success in life, and was noted for his industry 
and economy and good sense. He accumulated a landed estate of some one 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 631 

hundred and thirty-two acres in Lake county. He \va.s a standi Repuhhcan 
and supported the party's doctrines and principles from the time of its organ- 
ization. Both he and his good wife were Cathohcs. For some twenty or 
twenty-five years during the early history of the county he was United 
States mail carrier between Crown Point and Brunswick. Mother Schmal 
is still living, although she has reached the advanced age of eighty-five years, 
and she resides with Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Schmal, who care for her during 
her declining years. 

]\Ir. Schmal has been reared as a tiller of the soil and as a stockman, 
and his early education was received in his native township and in the Bruns- 
wick public schools. On February 12, 1889, he married Miss Caroline Herr- 
mann, by whom he has had eight children, three sons and five daughters, 
seven of whom are living. Joseph is in the eighth grade of school and very 
bright in his studies. Barbara is in the seventh grade, Josephine in the fifth 
grade, Elenora in the third o-rade, and Susan, Aenes and Albert are the three 
)'oungest. 

Mrs. Schmal was born in St. John township, November 8, 1865, being 
a daughter of Jacob and Katharine (Palm) Herrmann. There were fifteen 
children in her parents family, nine sons and si.x daughters, and of the nine 
living six are residents of Lake county, and the other three are as follows : 
John, a resident of^ Cissna Park, Illinois, is married and is a blacksmith by 
trade; Katie, wife of William Baunte, a painter in Chicago; and Albert, who 
is married and lives in Chicago Heights. Jacob Herrmann, the father of 
Mrs. Schmal, was born in Prussia in 1822 and died in 1895. He was a black- 
smith, learning his trade in Germany, and he has a farm in St. John township 
of this county. He and his wife were Catholics and he was a Democrat. 
His wife is still living in St. John, being seventy-seven years old and hale 
and active for one who has passed so many milestones of life. Mrs. Schmal 
was reared in St. John township, was educated in the common schools, and 
was confirmed by Bishop Durnger at the age of twelve. 

Mr. and ]Mrs. Schmal began life on the old homestead, and for sixteen 
years thev have been prominent German-American citi;^ens of Hanover town- 
ship. All the excellent improvements in the shape of outbuildings and of 
other kinds have been placed on the farm by Mr. Schmal, assisted, of course, 
bv his estimable wife. He is a lover of excellent stock, constantly endeavor- 



632 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

ing to improve the quality of his animals, and takes especial pride in his 
Chester White hogs. Mrs. Schmal, on her part, is a fancier of thorough- 
bred poultry, and her silverlaced Wyandottes are her particular care, and 
of this fine breed she has sold a goodly number for breeding purposes. At 
the present writing Mr. Schmal is manager of the Brunswick Creamery Com- 
pany, an enterprise which has been very successful during the last ten years 
of its existence. In politics he is a stanch Republican, having cast his first 
vote for Benjamin Harrison. He served as assessor of Hanover township 
for two years, filling that office most acceptably; at the last election of 1904 
and at the three prior elections he was inspector of elections. From all of 
which it may be seen that he stands high as a worthy and honorable citizen 
of Hano\er township, and is also one of the financially solid men of the 
township. Mr. and Mrs. Schmal are members of St. Anthony's Catholic 
church at Klaasville, and they are well known and highly esteemed in west 
Lake county, where they have been reared and passed their days since 
childhood. 

THOMAS T- WOOD. 

Thomas J- \Vood, man of alTairs at Crown Point, a leader in the Demo- 
cratic partv, and one of the most prominent lawyers in northwestern In- 
diana, has a career of unusual interest from whatever point of view it is 
beheld. In his early years he made his own way and paid from his own 
earnings for his educational advantages. When he entered the political 
field it was as a man of principles and definite convictions, and it is uni- 
versally true that the man who stands for something is certain to have 
manv loval adherents and sincere admirers. For a number of years Mr. 
Wood has wielded a large influence in public and party affairs, as many of- 
fices of honor and trust held by liim wimld indicate, and his work has as- 
sumed national importance since Indiana has tecome one of the "doubtful" 
states in national elections. Mr. Wood is a man of the highest integrity, 
and prosecutes both private and public affairs with an eye to the highest 
welfare of the community and state. 

Mr. Wood was born in Athens county, Ohio, September 30, 1844, 
being a son of Darius C. and Diana S. (Carter) Wood. His mother was 
a descendant of the great tarter family of Massachusetts. His father was 
a school teacher and farmer. This branch of the Wood family settled in 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 633 

America before the Revolutionary war, being of English and Welsh ex- 
traction. Their first home was at Litchfield, Connecticut, and later descend- 
ants of the family moved to Rochester, New York, and to the state of 
Michigan and to Ohio. Governor Wood of Ohio was of the family, as 
also was President Millard Fillmore. Many of Mr. Wood's relatives were sol- 
diers and officers in the war for American independence, and some of his 
direct ancestors feil in the liattles of Bunker Hill and Yorktown. 

When Thomas J. Wood was seven years old his father brought the 
family out to Indiana and settled on a farm near Terre Haute. The son 
lived at this place until he was twenty-two years old. spending much of his 
time in working on the farm. For two winters he attended the high school 
in Terre Haute, having gained his elementar}' education in the common 
schools of Vigo county. After his high school course he taught school for 
two years, and then took up the study of law in the office of Judge William 
Mack at Terre Haute. He later went to the Ann Arbor Law School, from 
which he graduated at the head of his class in 1868. For this literary and 
professional education he paid by his own efforts, either at manual labor or 
in teaching school. In his youth he formed excellent habits of industry and 
personal morality, and these staying principles have remained with him ever 
since. 

After he graduated at Ann Arbor he settled at Lowell in this county 
and began active practice of the law. He remained there only a short time, 
and in 1870 moved to Crown Point, where he has since carried on his ex- 
tensive legal business, practicing in all the county, state and federal courts. 
He has been retained in many important cases, and in the course of his pro- 
fessional career he has handled nearly four thousand court causes. He is 
considered a safe and reliable counselor, and is one of the strongest advo- 
cates in this part of the state, being especially successful in jury trials. 

Tklr. Wood's career in public life began soon after he entered upon the 
active work of his profession. He was elected to the offices of clerk and 
treasurer of Crown Point; was elected and held the office of state's attorney 
for two terms of two years each, from 1872 to 1876, and made a fine record 
in convicting criminals of all classes, from misdemeanors to murder. In 
1876 he was elected state senator for Lake and Porter counties, and during 
his four years in that office was identified with much important legislation. 



634 ■ HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

and he stood among the pre-eminent debaters on the floor of the senate and 
was a leader on the Democratic side. His alertness to the true interests of 
both the country and his party is illustrated by an incident during his sena- 
torial career. At a time when many of the Democratic senators were absent 
from the hall the Republicans took advantage of the occasion to call up some 
purely partisan legislation, hoping to get it through by whirlwind work be- 
fore their opponents could rally their forces. Mr. ^^"ood at once leaped into 
the breach by taking the floor and launching into a long-winded speech with 
a vehement arraignment of the Republican side, which he continued until the 
messengers could bring from various parts of the city the absentee Demo- 
cratic members, thus restoring the normal equilibrium and saving the day 
for tb.e party. While in the senate Mr. ^^'ood pushed through much legis- 
lation affecting land titles all over the state. In 1882 he was elected to the 
forty-eighth Congress, representing for two years the old Colfax district. In 
this strong Republican district he was defeated for re-election, but by less 
than three hundred votes. It is said that he was defeated by Democratic 
votes in Valparaiso and Chesterton, one thousand dollars having been the 
price paid to withdraw enough venal Democrats from his support in order 
to accomplish his defeat. Previous to the last Democratic national con- 
vention Mr. Wood was a much talked of favorite for the presidential can- 
didacy. He had friends at St. Louis from fifteen states, and had the Alton 
B. Parker movement failed on the first ballot Mr. Wood's name would have 
been placed before the convention and he would have received thirty-nine 
votes on the next ballot. 

Mr. Wood has been a prominent Mason for thirty years, iDcing a Mas- 
ter and a Royal Arch Mason. He has been an Odd Fellow for twenty- 
five years. He has been a member of the Methodist Episcopal church at 
Crown Point for sixteen years, and is a trustee and a member of the official 
Ixiard and active in church work, having filled the pulpit many times. 

May II, 1871, Mr. Wood married Miss Mary E. Pelton, of Crown 
Point. Her mother, Eliza Pettibone, is the widow of the late Dr. Harvey 
Pettibone. Her father, Hiram S. Pelton, was a prominent business man in 
Lake county, a successful merchant, and a fine man and much beloved by 
the people, having been one of the first county commissioners. For his 
time he left quite a large estate. Mary E. Pelton was a relative of John 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 635 

W. Pelton, a nephew of Hon. Samuel J. Tiklen, who was elected president 
of the United States by the people. Mr. and Mrs. Wood had seven children, 
but through the ravages of diphtheria lost five of them within six weeks. 
Mrs. Wood is a woman of splendid character and capabilities, motherly and 
kind-hearted, and one of the women who make great wives. 

Mr. Wood is personally a genial gentleman, wholly without deceit, 
straightforward, honest and earnest in all social relations. He is forceful 
in character, hates shams and puts truth and honesty above all other virtues, 
and is highly respected by all people of his community and accpiaintance. 
He is himself above the low level of light amusements, many of which 
he holds as tending to the moral degeneracy of the race, but at the same 
time he is broad-minded and liberal in his outlook on life, is optimistic of the 
future, has no jealousy of others and is not willing to cast others aside in 
his own race for the best of the world's possessions, and, withal, looks con- 
stantly on the sunny side of life and wants to see men made better and 
happier. But most prominent of all his characteristics is his firm and un- 
flinching devotion to what he sincerely believes to be right, and when the 
moral right and wrong are arrayed there is no doubt what side he will 
take. His own career has wrought out in him a sturdy independence and 
he feels thoroughly able to take care of himself on any proposition, and from 
this ability of self-control and direction of his energies into the channels 
which he chooses he is also able to give intelligent and valuable aid to causes 
and principles lying outside his own personal relations. He has pride in 
good moral society, believes in the beneficence of church influences for the 
betterment of the world, and his life has worked out for the general good 
and advancement of his fellow citizens. 

HENRY A. KLAAS. 

Henry A. Klaas, of Hanover township, belongs to a class of citizens 
noted for industry, thrift and native intelligence, derived largely from his 
German race and lineage, to which nationality Lake county is indebted for 
much of her permanent development and prosperity. 

Mr. Klaas was born in Hanover township, this county, June 15, 1857, 
being the eldest of eleven children, four sons and seven daughters, born to 
Christian and Willielmina (Brenker) Klaas. Six of these children beside 



636 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Klaas are living, namely : Louisa, wife of F. Berg, a farmer of Parnell, 
Missouri: Anna, wife of Fred Echterling, also a farmer at Parnell: 
August H., who is married and farming in Hanover township : Mary, wife 
of Joe Schenker, of Conception, Missouri ; Christian F., who is married and 
a farmer of West Creek township; Emma, wife of John Kretz, a harness 
dealer at Crown Point. 

Christian Klaas. the father, was born in Lippe-Detmold, Germany, in 
1828. and is still living at the age of seventy-six years. Being reared in 
Germany to the age of nineteen, he then took ship at Bremen and after a 
voyage of seven weeks reached New York, whence he came directly to Lake 
county, arriving with little money but with plenty of youthful energy and 
ambition. He purchased land from the government, and during a successful 
career he came into possession of about three hundred and eighty acres of 
land in Lidiana and Illinois. He was a Democrat in politics, and a member 
of the Catholic church. The village of Klaasville was named after his father, 
Henry, who also aided in the erection of the St. Anthony Catholic church in 
that place. Mother Klaas was also born in Germany, in the year 1832, and 
she is still living. 

]\lr. Klaas was reared in Hanover township, and was educated in both 
the English and German languages. At the age of fourteen he was con- 
firmed by Bishop Durnger. He w-as reared to the life of a farmer and 
stockman. November 28, 1882, he married Miss Mary Moenix, and all 
their twelve children are still living, as follows : Rosa E. was confirmed at 
the age of fourteen by Bishop Rademacher, was educated in the common 
schools through the eighth grade, and is now at home. Henry C, w'ho was 
in the eighth grade of school, is a farmer and living at home. Mary A. 
was confirmed at the age of fourteen by Bishop Rademacher and has taken 
the seventh grade of school work and also studied music. Veronica, con- 
firmed at the age of twelve, is in the seventh grade. Edward, confirmed by 
Bishop Alerding. is in the sixth grade. Agnes is in the sixth grade of 
school, Alma is in the fifth, Emma in the fourth, Anton B. in the third, and 
the three youngest children are Andrew C, John F. and Stella. 

Airs. Klaas was born in Lake county, December 5, 1861, being a 
daughter of Christopher and Anna Marie (Berg) Moenix, her parents natives 
of Germany and both now deceased. There were ten children in the Moenix 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 637 

family, six sons and four daughters, and of the four still living- two are resi- 
dents of Lake county, and Anna is in Illinois and Louie is in Canada. Mrs. 
Klaas was educated in the common schools, and was confirmed at the age of 
thirteen by Bishop Durnger. 

Mr. and Mrs. Klaas began life at his birthplace in Hanover township 
on land which his father ga\'e him. For twenty-two years, or almost a 
quarter of a century, they have resided m Hano\'er township, and they are 
citizens of the highest standing in every relation of life. They have reared 
a large and excellent family, and they are known among their friends and 
associates as people of industry and honesty and high worth. Mr. Klaas 
is a Democrat. ha\-ing cast his first vote for \\'. S. Hancock, and has sup- 
ported each candidate since. He is a friend of education and does all in 
his power to support the public school system. He and his wife and the 
older children are members of the Catholic church. St. Anthony's, at Klaas- 
ville, and Mrs. Klaas is a member of the Rosary Sodality and the girls of the 
St. Mary's Sodality. He and his wife own one hundred and thirteen acres 
of good land in Hanover township, and he is one of the prosperous German 
citizens who stand high in the estimation of the people. 

FRANK H. LYONS. 

Frank H. Lyons, in the real estate and insurance business at Hammond, 
has for a number of years been identified with the industrial, public and 
business affairs of this city, where he has practically spent the vears ui his 
life. He is a young man of much ability, alert and eager, and gifted with 
an energy and an enterprise which make him influential in his circle of 
business acquaintances. 

Mr. Lyons was born in Sandusky, Ohio, September i8, 1873. a son of 
John M. and Winifred (Conlon) Lyons, both natives of Ireland, and the 
latter one of a large family born to Michael Conlon, who was an Irish farmer 
and died in Ireland at the advanced age of eighty-five years. The father of 
John M. Lyons was also a life-long Ireland farmer, and was about ninety 
years old when he died. There were twelve children in his family. John 
;\I. Lyons was a general contractor, and after his migration to America 
located on Kelly's Island in Lake Erie. About 1874 he came to Indiana, 
and a year later located at Hammond, where he has since lived. He and 
his wife are members of the Roman Catholic church. Thev had nine 



638 HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 

children, four sons and five daughters, and the five now hving are Peter J., 
Frank H., John and Matthew, all of Hammond, and Miss Winifred, of 
Chicago. 

Mr. Frank H. Lyons was reared in Hammond, recei\ing his education 
in the public schools. He afterward took up the trade of tinner and sheet 
metal worker, and followed it for twelve years. He was foreman of the 
sheet metal department of the G. H. Hammond Packing Company for five 
years. From 1898 until 1902 he held the office of city clerk, and during 
the same period was deputy clerk of the superior court. Since lea\ing this 
office he has been engaged in the insurance and real estate business, and 
has already built up a creditable amount of business. 

June 26, igoo, Mr. Lyons married Miss Mollie B. Hastings, a daughter 
of Thomas and Margaret (Clark) Hastings. They have one son, named 
Robert F. Mr. and Mrs. Lyons are members of the Catholic church. Their 
residence is at 142 Russell street, at w-hich location they also own another 
good house. He affiliates with the Benevolent and Protective Order of 
Elks and the Maccabees, and in politics is a Democrat. 

MICHAEL KOLB. 

Michael Kolb, the well known druggist and pharmacist at Hammond, 
is one of the native sons of Lake county, and has proved an honor and a 
credit to his county and city in business and in matters of citizenship. He is 
a man of known integrity among his associates, and his worth of character 
and thrifty enterprise have gained him a well deserved place among the fore- 
most men of Hammond. His life span covers much of the history of Lake 
county from the primitive pioneer past to the wonderful progress of the 
present, and he has faithfully borne his share of the duties and responsibilities 
in private, business and political life. 

Mr. Kolb was born on a farm in Lake county. February 28, 1855, 
being the eldest of the family of Michael and Katharine (Becker) Kolb, 
both natives of Alsace-Loraine. Germany, and the latter being one of the 
nine children of George Becker, a life-long German farmer, who attained 
the age of seventy-six years. Both the paternal great-grandfather and 
grandfather of Mr. Kolb bore the name of Michael, and the grandfather 
spent his life in Germany as a farmer, dying when an old man. He had two 
children by his first marriage, and was twice married. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 639 

Michael Kolb, the father of Mr. Michael Kolb, grew to manhood in his 
fatherland, and in 1854 came to America and located in Lake county. He 
bought a farm in St. John township, and improved it and reared his family 
on it. \\"hen he bought the land it was wild and covered with woods, in 
which were often seen the wild deer. He cleared it up, and eventually had 
a fine farmstead, on which he lived until 1893, since which time he has resided 
with hi?; son Michael. His wife died November 14, 1879, at the age of 
fifty-nine years. They were both Catholics. There were nine children in 
their family, four sons and five daughters, and the four now living are : 
Michael; Joseph, of Hammond; Katharine, wife of Anthony Kouratt, of 
Chicago; and Rose, wife of John C. Klein, of Chicago. 

Mr. Kolb spent the first twenty years of his life on his father's farm, 
where, among other valuable things, he learned to be thrifty and industrious. 
He attended the district schools, and also the high school at Crown Point, 
where lie graduated in 1878. For the following twelve years he was en- 
gaged in teaching school. In tlie latter part of this period he spent his 
leisure in learning the drug business from his brother-in-law, L. G. Kramer, 
and in 1890 he came to Hammond and entered the drug business on his own 
account, which enterprise he still continues with profit and success. 

Mr. Kolb is a Democrat in politics. He and his wife are members 
of the Catholic church, and he belongs to the Catholic Order of Foresters. 
His residence is at 23 Condit street, where he erected a fine home in 1891. 
He was married May 4, 1880, to Miss Angeline Kramer, a daughter of 
ilatthias and Susan (W'achter) Kramer. Eleven children have been born 
of their union: Rose M., Michael E., Maria, deceased, Matthias J., 
Leonard G., Clara K.. Agnes M.. Francis A., Katharine M., Cecelia, and 
Edward O. 

EDWIN J. MUZZALL. 

Edwin J. Muzzall, proprietor of a livery stable at Crown Point, where 
he is also engaged in buying and selling horses, was born in Ross township. 
Lake county, August 28, 1861. The family of which he is a representative 
is of English lineage and was founded in America by Abrani Muzzall, a 
native of England, who, on emigrating to America, established his home in 
Canada. He afterward came to Indiana, settling in Lake county in 1836. 



640 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Here he took up land from the government, for wliich he paid one dollar 
and a quarter per acre, thus becoming the owner of a quarter section in Ross 
township. He was one of the first settlers in this part of the state and 
found here an undeveloped region. The prairies were uncultivated and 
unclaimed and the forests still stood in their primeval strength, only here 
and there could be seen the little log cabin of the pi<ineer. and the work of 
progress and improvement seem.ed scarcely begun. John Muzzall, the father 
of our subject, was born in Canada and. being brought to Lake county by 
his parents, was here reared amid the wild scenes of frontier life. When 
he had arrived at years of maturity he wedded Miss Julia Irish, a native of 
Vermont, in which state she spent her girlhood days. The young couple 
began their domestic life upon a farm, and John ^Nluzzall continued to engage 
in agricultural pursuits until 1891, when he removed to Crown Point and 
became interested in the livery business in connection with his son Edwin J. 
In 1894 John Muzzall was called upon to mourn the loss of his wife. There 
were three children of that marriage, the daughters being Chloe and Mary. 

Edwin J. Muzzall. the only son and the youngest child, was reared upon 
the old home farm in Ross township and at the usual age entered the district 
sch(TOls. where he continued his education until he had mastered the branches 
of learning taught therein. He was also early trained to habits of industry 
and economy upon the home farm, and when but a boy became familiar with 
all the duties and labors that fall to the lot of the agriculturist. He continued 
to engage in farming until 1891. when he removed to Crown Point and with 
his father established a livery barn and also began buying and selling horses. 
The barn is well equipped with a fine line of carriages and a number of excel- 
lent horses which are rented to the general public, and a liberal patronage is 
now accorded Mr. Muzzall. He is an excellent judge of horses and is thus 
enabled to make judicious purchases and profitable sales. He has been 
engaged in this business for twelve years, and in the year 1903 he bought 
and sold over four hundred head of horses. Fie goes long distances, as far 
as Logansport and Monticello. to make his purchases, and he is now the 
largest horse dealer of the county. He also owns a farm of one hundred 
and six acres of valuable land, pleasantly located a mile and a half .southwest 
of Crown Point, and this returns to him a good income. On the i6th of 
August, 1893. Edwin J. Muzzall was united in marriage to Miss Jennie 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 641 

Patton.the youngest daughter of Joseph Patton, one of the early settlers of 
Lake county. ^Ir. and ^Irs. Aluzzall have two sons and a daughter, Percy, 
Leslie and Mabel. 

IMr. !Muzzall is con.nected with the Modern \\'oodmen of America and 
Ihe Knights of the Maccabees at Crown Point, and has taken an active part 
in these lodges, filling ^■arious of^ces therein. His political allegiance is 
given the Republican party, and he keeps well informed on the questions of 
the day. both politically and otherwise. He is deeply interested in the 
welfare and progress of his native county, and hi? co-operation has been a 
factor that is ever counted upon in support of all measures for the gen- 
eral good. 

JOHN PEARCE. 

John Pearce. the well-known stock-raiser of Section 24, Eagle Creek 
township, has spent all his life of over sixty years in Lake count}', and belongs 
to one of the pioneer families of northwestern Indiana. He did not enjoy 
manv vears of grace during his boyhood, for just alx^ut as soon as he could 
manage a plow or perform the ordinary duties of a farm he took his deceased 
father's place and helped provide for the family welfare. He has laeen more 
than ordinarily successful, and his fine h-ogs and cattle have a high reputa- 
tion throughout the county. While so busily engaged with the serious side 
of life, he has not neglected the manv other interests of societ}' and citizen- 
ship, and is held in high esteem for the worthy career that be has made for 
himself during a long life in one community. 

Mr. Pearce was born on the farm where he now resides, January 11, 
1842. His grandfather. Squire Pearce, was a native of New Jersey, of Scotch 
origin, and was among the pioneers of LaPorte county, Indiana. Michael 
Pearce, the father of John, was born near Hamilton, Ohio, in 1S08, and 
died in 1861. He was reared in bis native place, and in 1838 accompanied 
his father to Indiana, making settlement in Lake county, where he passed 
the remainder of his years. He married Mary J. Dinwiddle, who was born 
in Trumbull county, Ohio, in 1818, and died August 8, 1894. Mr. John 
Pearce was the oldest of ten children, seven of whom are living, the others 
being: Harriet, wife of Isaac Bryant, of Hebron, Indiana; Nancy Ann, 
wife of O. V. Servis, of Eagle Creek township; Mary J., wife of W. T. 
11 



6+2 HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTi'. 

Buchanan, of Eagle Creek townsliip; Susanna, wife of G. H. Stahl, of Eagle 
Creek To-«-nship : Sedi 3— ; and Thomas, on the old homestead. 

Mr. Jdm Pearce attended oi>e of the priniitiTe ]c§-cabdn schools, now 
a tJiii^ of andent history in Indiana. He got efficient training in farm 
work from Ms faliher, and at the latter's death be took mp tl>e managenxait 
of the home place and has carried it on ever since. He has one hundred and 
tweniTi- acres in the home farm and fifty acres elsewhere in the township, 
and he and his son Jay M. make a specialty of raising hogs and cattle 
respecti%-dT of the Poland China and Shorthorn Tarieties. He has line facili- 
ties for hc^-raising, and has been in the business tor twraity-five years. 

Mr. Pearce is a stanch Republican in politics, and has taken a good 
citizen's part in public aSairs. He is an active member of the Masonic lodge 
at Grown Pcrant. He was married to Ikliss Elizabeth B, Foster, a native ol 
Pennsvlrania and a daughter of Frederick and Betsey Foster, likewise 
natives of Pennsylvania- Mrs. Pearce was reared in her native state to -fee 
age of axteen, and then came to Lake county, and in this and in Porter 
countv taught school for sevoal years before her marriage, being one of the 
instroctars in Bal Institnte at Crown Point. Mr. and Mrs. Pearce have 
Iw^o children Erii^, and two are deceased : Florence is the wife of Thomas 
Ross, of Eagle Creek township; and Jay M. is the partner of his father. 

CLIFFORD C ROBIXSOX, M. D. 

One of the younger representatives of the medical profession in north- 
western Indiana is Dr. Qiffcrd Clarence Rdbinsooi. who snoe 1902 has en- 
gaged in practice at Indiana Harbar, bringing to his work accurate and ccam- 
prebensive knowledge of tibe meet nsodem ideas, discoveries and methods 
used bv the n-jembers of the medical fraternity. He is a native son of In- 
diana, his tnrth having occurred in Elkhart, on the :?7th of Aitgnst, 1S74. 
His paternal grandfather. Squire Robinson, M. D., was a natiine of tbe siate 
of Xew York and in eaify Hfe was a njanisiter of the Ikmkard church, bat 
later be took up die study of medicine and began practice when thimvax 
vears of age. At tibe time of the Cavil war be sers«d in xbe L'nicn anny as 
a surgecin, thus rendering valuable aid to the boys in bhie. He became a resi- 
dent of "■■" '^'— : at an eariy period in the settlement and improvement of the 
state, a: ard removed to Michigan, locating at Benton Harbor, where 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUXTY. 6-13 

lie tiied at an advanced age. He married a Miss Clem and they reared a 
large family. This number included Dr. Clarence S. Robinson, who was 
bom in Indiana and is now a practicing physician and surgeon of Dowagiac. 
Michigan, where he has lived for the past ten years, enjoying a liberal pat- 
ronage. He married Miss Agnes Clark, also a native of Indiana. Her 
father, who was a native of the state of Xew York and was a farmer by 
cKCupation, enlisted for service in the Civil war, as a meml)er of the Union 
amiy, and was killed in battle. His wife bore the maiden name of Julia 
Fuller and they had a numerous family. Their daughter, Mrs. Robinson, 
passed away in 1897, when thirty-seven years of age. She held membership 
in the Baptist church, to which Dr. Clarence S. Robinson also belongs. Their 
children were two in numl)er, but one died in infancy. 

Dr. Clifford Clarence Robinson, of Indiana Harbor, the third genera- 
tion of the family to engage in the practice of medicine, was reared in the 
vicinitA" of Dowagiac, Michigan, and attended the public schools there, being 
graduated from the high school with the class of 1896. He then took up the 
study of medicine in tlie medical department of the University of Michigan, 
at Ann Arbor, and on the completion of the full course was graduated in the 
class of 1902 and entered upon the practice of his chosen profession in In- 
diana Harbor, in August of that year. Already he has gained a good pat- 
ronage and has demonstrated his ability- to successfully cope with the intricate 
problems which continually confront the physician. He is a member of the 
Lake County Medical Society. 

On the 1st day of July, 1903, Dr. Robinson was united in marriage to 
Miss Belle Corless, a daughter of Hiram and Martha Corless, and during 
their residence in Indiana Harbor they have won the favorable regard and 
friendship of many. In politics he is a Republican, and in citizenship is pub- 
lic-spirited and progressive. 

GILBERT C. SAUNDERS. M. D. 

Dr. Gilbert C. Saunders, who is engaged in die practice of medicine and 
surger}- at Indiana Harbor, was bom at Belle Vernon, Pennsylvania, July 18. 
1859, and is one of the four sons whose parents were William and Susan 
(Coutant) Saunders. The family was established in .\inerica at an early 
period in the colonization of the new world by ancestors who came from 



6U HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Scotland. The grandfather was born in \'irginia and died at Fish Creek, 
that state, when in middle life. He was a typical soutliern gentleman, and 
owned a plantation which he operated with the aid of his slaves. His wife 
was Mrs. Susan Saunders and they were the parents of one son and one 
daughter. The son, \\'illiam Saunders, father of Dr. Saunders, was born 
in West Virginia, and after arriving at years of maturity he wedded Miss 
Susan Coutant, a native of Connecticut. Her father. Gilbert Coutant. was 
also born in that state. He was a shipbuilder and owned a ship yard at 
Xew Haven, but subsequently removed to Honesdale. Xew York, where his 
remaining days were passed, his death occurring when he had reached the 
seventy-sixth milestone on life's journey. In the family were two sons and 
five daughters. The name Coutant is of French origin and was formerly 
spelled Coutante. The ancestral history of the family can be traced back to 
the time of Charlemagnie. William Saunders was reared upon the planta- 
tion owned by his father in \'irginia and afterward engaged in the manu- 
facture of glass, but later entered professional life, beginning the practice of 
medicine in Peru, Indiana, when forty-five years of age. Subsequently he 
removed to La Salle. Illinois, where he continued in active practice up to the 
time of his death, which occurred in 1S91, when he was sixty-three years of 
age. His wife still survives. Like him she is a Methodist, and has long 
guided her life by the teachings and precepts of the church. To this worthy 
couple were bom eleven children, four sons and seven daughters, of whom 
seven are now living: William, a resident of Newcastle. Pennsylvania; Gil- 
bert C, whose name introduces this record: Sarah E., the wife of Thomas A. 
Downs, of Orestes, Indiana: Charles B., who is Hving in Chicago, Illinois, 
where he is engaged in the practice of medicine; Ida. the wife of John Jen- 
nings, of Chicago; Mar\-. the wife of Charles Johnson, of the same city; and 
Belle, of La Salle, Illinois. 

Dr. Gilbert C. Saunders resided in Pennsylvania until fifteen years of 
age and then went to La Salle, Illinois, with his parents. His early education 
was acquired in the public schools of Pennsylvania and he afterward attended 
a grammar school in La Salle, Illinois, while later he continued his studies 
in a business college in Davenport, Iowa. He was trained for his professional 
duties in Chicago and San Francisco, attending the Hahnemann Medical Col- 
lege of the former city and afterward matriculating in the Hahnemann Hos- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 645 

pital College, of San Francisco, from which institution lie was graduated in 
1894. He began practicing in San Trancisco, where he remained for about 
nine years or until 1903, when be returned eastward and established an ofticc 
in Indiana Harbor, where be has since been located. He is deeply interested 
in his profession both from a scientific and humanitarian standpoint, and 
continued reading and investigation constantly broaden his knowledge and 
promote bis efficiency in the line of his chosen profession. 

On the 8tb of January. 1883, Dr. Saunders was united in marriage to 
Miss ]\Iary A. Robson, a daughter of Angus and Maria (Walters) Robson, 
who were natives of England. Her father came to .\merica when twenty- 
one years of age, and her mother was a little maiden of only eight summers 
when she crossed the Atlantic. After their marriage they resided at Belle 
Yernon, Pennsylvania, for some time and subsequently ren.ioved to Rock 
Island. Illinois, where Mr. Robson died on the 9th of July, 1880, at the age 
of forty-seven years. His widow still survi\es him and now resides at El- 
wood, Indiana. He was engaged in the manufacture of glass. He was a 
son of William and Mary A. (Campbell) Robson. The former died in Eng- 
land at the age of seventy-six years. In their family were one daughter and 
several sons, including Angus Robson. The maternal grandfather of Mrs. 
Saunders was James W. Walters, a native of England, and on crossing the 
Atlantic to America be settled in Blossburg, Pennsyhania, while later he 
established his home in Belle \"ernon, that state. In the year 1849 ^''^ went 
to California, attracted by the discovery of gold on the Pacific coast and 
later he made his way to old Mexico, where he died at a very advanced age. 
His wife bore the maiden name of Mary Frank, and they were the parents 
of two sons and two daughters. To Mr. and i\Irs. Angus Robson were born 
eleven children, se\'en sons antl four daughters, six of whom are now living: 
John A.: Mrs. Saunders: Isaljel : James R. : ]\Iaria Jane, the wife of John 
Evans ; and Angus C. 

To Dr. and Mrs. Saunders ha\-e been born two children, ^Margaret and 
Lester, but the latter died at the age of thirteen months. Dr. Saunders is a 
member of the Knights of Pythias fraternity, while his political allegiance 
is gi\-en to the Republican party. Although he has made his home in Indiana 
Harbor for only a brief period he has already gained a favorable acquaintance 
both professional!}- and socially and enjciys tlie high regard of many friends. 



646 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

ISAAC H. SCOFFERN. 

Isaac H. Scoffern, who for fifteen years has been agent for the Elgin, 
Joliet & Eastern Railroad, or Outer Belt Line, at Hobart, was born in Eng- 
land, February 20, 1858, and when twelve years of age came to the Laiited 
States with his parents, Richard and Susan (Cory) Scoffern. The father 
was born in England and was a mason by trade. He followed that occupa- 
tion in the old world until about 1870, when he crossed the Atlantic to 
America and located in Allen, Hillsdale county, Michigan, where he followed 
both farming and mason work. He now resides in Hobart, making his home 
with his son, Isaac H. His wife was also born in England and died on the old 
home farm in Michigan at the age of seventy-eight years. This worthy couple 
were the parents of six children, two daughters and four sons, but the first 
two died in infancy. Robert F. is a resident of Chickasaw, Indian Terri- 
tory, having been appointed a judge there by the government. Dixon Rich- 
ard is cashier of the Niles City Bank, at Niles, Michigan. Elizabeth is the 
wife of A. B. Kirchof¥, and resides at Franklin Park, Illinois, his business 
being that of an employe in the auditor's office of the Chicago, Milwaukee 
& St. Paul Railroad Company at Chicago. 

Isaac H. Scoffern, the fourth child and third son of the family, spent the 
first twelve years of his life in the land of his nativity and then became a 
resident of Hillsdale county, Michigan. He attended the public schools of 
England and afterward continued his education in the public schools of Allen, 
Michigan. The duties of the farm claimed his attention during the summer 
months until he was twenty-one years of age, when he began railroading, be- 
ing employed in 1879 as a checker or tallyman in the freight department of 
the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railroad at Chicago. He was after- 
ward promoted to the position of special delivei7man for the same company, 
which position he filled until about 1S83. He then accepted a position as 
operator and agent with the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad at 
Spalding, Illinois, where he remained for three years, when he was trans- 
ferred to Minonk, Illinois, where he remained for one year as agent for the 
Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Railroad. In 1889 he came to Hobart as agent for 
the same company and has since filled this position covering a period of fifteen 
years, a fact which indicates his loyalty to the company and also his fidelity 
and capaliilitv in the performance of the duties which devolve upon him. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 64T 

On the 24th of August, 1879, Mr. Scoffern was united in nianiage to 
Miss Mary Wonnacott. a daughter of Jolui and Sarah \\'onnacott. Slie was 
born in Chicago and was reared and educated there until twelve years of age. 
Their children are Robert Floyd, who is now in the employ of the Elgin, 
Joliet & Eastern Railroad Company; and Bessie Edith, who is assisting her 
father in the office. 

Mr. Scoffern was one of the leading members of the Methodist Episcopal 
church at Hobart, takes a most active and helpful part in its w'ork and is now^ 
serving as treasurer and trustee. He is also a recognized leader of the Pro- 
hibition party in this community and is chairman of the central committee 
for Lake county. He is likewise a member of the Modern Woodmen Camp 
and is well known in Hobart as one of its leading citizens who favors progress 
and improvement along every line which tends to upbuild humanit}'. He is 
the champion of educational, social, temperance and moral measures, and his 
influence and support are ever on the side of right, truth and justice. 

MATHL\S G. STERNBERG. 

Mathias G. Sternberg, proprietor of the Block Avenue Hotel at Indiana 
Harbor, was born at College Point, New York, April 6, 1855, and in both the 
paternal and maternal lines lie comes of German ancestry. His paternal 
grandfather resided in Holstein, Germany, and there he spent his entire life, 
nor did the maternal grandfather ever leave that country. The parents of 
our subject were George and Wilhelmina Sternberg, also natives of the 
fatherland. The former became a school teacher and crossed the Atlantic 
to America some time in the '50s, settling in New York. He proved a loyal 
son of his adopted country and at the time of the Civil war he espoused the 
cause of the Union, enlisting under Captain Roma, with whose command 
he went to the front. He was killed at the battle of Fredericksburg, and was 
long survived by his wife, wdio died in 1886 at the age of fifty-six years. 
Both were members of the Lutheran church. In their family were fourteen 
children, six sons and eight daughters, but only two of the number are now 
living, the sister of our subject being Dora, the wife of Nicholas Schwartz, 
of College Point, Long Island, New York. 

Mathias G. Sternberg resided on Long Island in his early boyhood days 
and attended the public schools there. He afterward went to Delaware. 



648 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Sullivan county, New York, w here he worked as a farm hand for two years, 
and on the expiration of that period he removed to Waterbury, Connecticut. 
where he was employed by the Plume & Atwood Company, manufacturers of 
various kinds of brass goods. There he continued until the spring of 1876, 
when he went to Philadelphia and was employed by the Centennial Exposi- 
tion Company in the machinery hall. In the following August he came west 
and took passage on board the steamer Tidal \\"ave of the Diamond Joe line, 
whereby he proceeded from Fulton, Illinois, to Stillwater, Minnesota, accom- 
panied by his brother, Casper Sternberg. In the fall of 1876 he made his way 
to Chicago and secured employment with the Holmes & Pyatt Company, man- 
ufacturers of printing presses. He continued in that service until 1878. when 
he accepted the position of clerk for G. E. Smith in the Metropolitan Hotel 
on Wells street, acting in that capacity until 1880. He then went to the 
town of Harvey and began working for the Hopkins Manufacturing Com- 
pany, manufacturers of mowing machines, and during two yexirs was asso- 
ciated with that enterprise. The company then erected a hotel called the 
Hopkins House and Mr. Sternberg assumed its management. Later, how- 
ever, he again entered the employ of the Holmes-Pyatt Company, but after 
a short time he made his way to Montana, locating on a ranch twenty-two 
miles from Livingston. There he lived for a time and subsequently returned 
to Chicag'o, where he entered the employ of the William Deering Harvester 
Company. In 1887 he furnished a hotel for G. E. Smith called LeGrand. 
and he later became proprietor of the Metropolitan Hotel, which he conducted 
until 1893, when he entered into business relations with the Piano Agricul- 
tural Works at West Pullman, being expert road man for that house. In 
the fall of 1903 be came to Indiana Harbor and has since been engaged in 
the hotel business here, being now proprietor of the Block Avenue Hotel. 

On the 17th of August, 1883, 'Sir. Sternberg was united in marriage 
to Miss Rose Shiller. Five children were born of this union, four daughters 
and a son: Florilla and Orilla, twins; Matbias G. : Doris: and Rosa, who 
died in infancy. Mr. and Mrs. Sternberg are members of the Congregational 
church, and he belongs to the Knights of Pythias fraternity. Politically he 
is a Democrat, but has had neither time nor inclination to seek public i:)ffice, 
preferring to give his attention to his busip.ess affairs, in which he has met 
with very good success. All that he possesses has been accpiireil through his 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 049 

own labors and industry, and lie has steadily worked his way upward so tliat 
he deserves much credit for what he has accomphslied. 

REV. EDWARD F. BARRETT. 

Rev. Edward F. Barrett, who has been the beloved pastor of All Saints 
Catholic church at Hammond for the past seven years, has almost the entire 
credit for the present flourishing' condition of his church and parish. The 
church had been organized but a year when he took charge, and there were 
then but seventeen families under his religious care. There are now one hun- 
dred and thirty-eight families. The church and the schoolhouse were built 
in 1897, and there are now two hundred pupils in attendance. A handsome 
rectory of brick was erected in 1898, and in the following year the sisters' 
convent was built. Father Barrett has thrown his whole heart and religious 
zeal into the cause, and has accomplished wonders in the short time of his 
pastorate. He is a tireless worker not only in the cause of his own church 
but for humanity in general, and he richly deserves his immense popularity 
among both Catholics and Protestants. His kindness of heart, his benevo- 
lence and broad public spirit are traits of his character that appeal to all 
men, and his depth of learning and catholicity of sympathy enable him to 
wield a potent influence for righteousness in his community. 

Father Barrett was born in Rutland, Vermont, December 22, 1867, be- 
ing a son of James and Ann (Clifford) Barrett, natives of Tipperary county. 
Ireland. Both his maternal and his paternal grandfather died in Ireland. 
His father has been for fifty-two years foreman of the Vermont Marble Com- 
pany at Rutland, and he and his wife are highly esteemed citizens of that 
place. They had seven sons and three daughters, nine of whom are men- 
tioned as follows: John, of Rutland, Vermont: W^illiam, of New York 
city; Patrick, of Rutland; James, of Mexico; Sarah, wife of John Purcell, 
of Rutland ; Michael, who died at the age of sixteen ; Henry, of Rutland : 
Rev. Edward F., of Hammond; and Mary E., of Hammond. 

Father Barrett was reared in his native city of Rutland, and attended both 
the public and the parochial schools there. He was a student in Assumption 
College in Canada, and took his theological course in the Grand Seminary 
at Montreal. He was ordained to the priesthood in July, 1895, at Belle Isle, 
by Bishop La Flech, and in the same year became assistant pastor of St. 
Patrick's church at Fort Wavne, Indiana, under Father Delaney. He re- 



650 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

mained at Fort Wayne for two years and then came to Hammond, where he 
took charge of All Saints' church as the successor of Rev. John Cook, who 
had been its first pastor and organizer in the previous year. 1896. 

E. H. GUYER. 

E. H. Guyer, who is engaged in merchandising and also in dealing in 
stock at Hobart, was born in Calhoun county, Michigan, Jnne 8, 1854. His 
father, Andrew Guyer, was one of the pioneer settlers of Calhoun county. 
His wife, who bore the maiden name Mary Royce, died during the infancy of 
her son, E. H. Guyer. In the family were twelve children. The eldest brother 
was killed in the battle of Stone River during the Civil war. Mr. Guyer was 
the youngest child of his father's first marriage, but has a half-sister born of 
the second marriage. He was but fifteen years of age when he started out in 
life on his own account, and in 1874 he made his way to Lake county, Lidiana, 
where he secured employment in a brickyard at driving a team by the day and 
month. He worked for about four years in the butchering business, and in 
1884 he established a meat market of his own in Hobart. He is also en- 
gaged in buying, selling and shipping stock and also dealing in hay. To some 
extent he has dealt in real estate and now owns considerable property at 
Hobart and Indiana Harbor. In 1897 he built his present business block, 
one of the substantial structures of the city. 

In 1884 Mr. Guyer was united in marriage to Miss Rebecca Green, a 
daughter of John A. and Cordelia (Bird) Green. She was born in Lake 
county, being a representative one of the pioneer families here. The home of 
Mr. and Mrs. Guyer is celebrated for its gracious hospitality, and the hos- 
pitality of the best homes of the city is extended to them. Mr. Guyer is a 
Cleveland Dtemocrat, but at local elections votes for the candidate \\hom he 
thinks best qualified for office. He is identified with the Masonic fraternity 
at Hobart. He has traveled extensively over the county, buying and selling- 
stock, and is recognized as a most progressive business man of Hobart, whose 
success indicates his life of thrift and industry. 

JOHN F. TAKE, ^I. D. 

In professional circles Dr. John F. Take has won a position of prom- 
inence that is an indication of his skill, close application, determined purpose 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 051 

and laudable ambition. He is largely a self-educated as Avell as a self-made 
man, and he has exerted his efforts in a calling where advancement depends 
entirely upon individual merit. Not by gift, by purchase or by influence can it 
be secured. A physician's labors must stand the test of practical work, and 
favorable public opinion is won only as he demonstrates his power to suc- 
cessfully cope with the intricate problems continually presented by disease. 
That Dr. Take is now enjoying a large practice is indicative of his thorough 
understanding of the principles of the science of medicine and his correct- 
ness of their application to the needs of suffering" humanity. 

Numbered among the native sons of Illinois, Dr. Take was born in 
Fountain Green, Hancock county, on the 6th of April, 1864. His father, 
Charles Take, was a native of Germany and came to America when twenty- 
one years of age, hoping that he might have better business opportunities in 
the new world than were afforded him in his native country. A farmer by 
occupation, he devoted his entire life to that calling in order to provide for 
his family, but he died at a comparatively early age. His wife bore the maiden 
name of Mary Church and was a native of Indiana. They were the parents 
of three children, two sons and a daughter, but the latter died in infancy and 
the brother of Dr. Take is known as Robert Hetrick, having been adopted 
by the Hetrick family of Laharpe, Illinois, when but three years of age, his 
father having died. He is now a merchant of Denver, Colorado, and is a 
journalist by profession. 

Dr. Take, the eldest of the three children, was only six years of age at 
the time of his father's death. He afterward lived with a family by the 
name of Hopper until eleven 3ears of age, and during that time was a resi- 
dent of Hancock county, Illinois. His mother then removed to Rockford, 
Michigan, and Dr. Take resided with her there until eighteen years of age, 
during which time he attended the common schools and also assisted in the 
work of the home farm. Later he went to North Dakota, where he spent 
one year, and subsequently removed to Lamars, Iowa, where he attended high 
school for two years. By earnest labor he gained the money necessary to 
defray his college expenses. Desirous of becoming a member of the medical 
fraternity he pursued a course in reading under Dr. Prosser, of Lamars, Iowa, 
for a year, and next went to Chicago in the fall of 1887. There he entered 
the Bennett Medical College and was graduated from that institution with the 



652 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

class of 1889. 'In the fall of the same year he matriculated in the Chicago 
Homeopathic College and was graduated in the spring of i8go. On the i5tli 
of April, of the same year. Dr. Take located for practice in Whiting, opening 
an office on Front street. He was the first physician to locate here and he 
has been in constant practice in the town since that time, building up an ex- 
tensive practice which has constantly grown in volume and importance. He 
has made a specialty of the diseases of children and is particularly proficient 
along that line. Dr. Take is a member of the Eclectic ]\Iedical and Surgi- 
cal Society of Chicago, and he is a student who is constantly promoting 
his efficiency through reading and investigation. He discharges the duties 
of his profession with a sense of conscientious obligation, and his ability 
has long been proved by the excellent results which attend his efforts. 

In November, 1887, Dr. Take was united in marriage to Miss Mary 
Isabel Haines, of Rockford. Michigan, who was born in that city and is a 
daughter of Moses Davton Haines, whose birth nccurred in Dutchess county, 
New York. Her mother bore the maiden name of Jane Wilkinson, and was 
also a native of Dutchess county. In their family were eight children, three 
sons and five daughters, of whom Mrs. Take is the sixth child and fifth 
daughter. Her birth occurred July 8, 1866. and she was reared in Rockford, 
Michigan, attending the public schools there and afterward becoming a 
student in St. Mary's Academy. To the Doctor and his wife have been born 
two children: Lena Frances, who was born June 15, 1889, at 3636 Fifth 
avenue, in Chicago: and Milton Jay. at 304 One Hundred and Nineteenth 
street in AVhiting, Indiana, on the loth of May, 1892. 

Dr. Take has been a life-long Republican and has ser\'ed Whiting as a 
member of the town board of health, but aside from this has had no political 
aspirations. He is a self-educated as well as self-made man, having earned 
the money which enabled him to pursue his college course. The history of 
mankind is replete with illustrations of the fact that it is only under the pres- 
sure of adversity and the stimulus of opposition that the best and strongest 
in man are brought out and developed, and the life record of Dr. Take is 
another proof of this statement. In private life be has gained that warm 
personal regard which arises from true nobility of character, deference for the 
opinions of others, kindness and geniality. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 653 

FRANXIS E. STEPHENS, D. D. S. 

Dr. Francis Euceives Stephens, who is engaged in the practice of den- 
tistry in Indiana Harbor, was born in Sharon, Mercer county, Pennsylvania, 
on the 29th of June, 1880, and is a representative of an old English family 
that for several generations resided in Lydney. Gloucestershire, England. 
His father, iiis grandfather and his great-grandfather all bore the name of 
John Stephens. The last named was connected with the tin industry in 
Lydney, his native town, and there died at the age of ninety-two years, while 
his wife, Mrs. Hannah Stephens, departed this life at the age of seventy-four 
years. Their family of three sons and four daughters included John Stephens, 
2d. who spent his entire life in Lydney. where he worked as a hammer- 
smith. He married Charlotte Hawkens of that town, a daughter of Samuel 
and Sarah Hawkens, who were also natives of Lydney and died at the ages 
of eighty-nine and forty-two years, respectively. Mr. Hawkens was a ship- 
ping contractor who loaded and unloaded vessels in the canal and at the 
dock, and in his family were two children, a son and daughter, the latter 
Mrs. Stephens. John Stephens, 2d, died in 1899, ^"^ '^'S wife in Alarch, 
1902. Their only son, John Stephens, 3d, is the father of Dr. Stephens. He 
was born in Lydney, December 2, 1844, was reared and educated there and 
throughout his entire life has been connected with the iron industry. Com- 
ing to this countrv, he was employed in various places, and winning promo- 
tions from time to time. He is now superintendent of the Inland Steel Com- 
pany of Indiana Harbor, employing almost a thousand men. A detailed ac- 
count of his life and work is given on another page of this volume. 

Dr. Stephens, one of his ten children, acquired his early education in the 
public schools of Sharon, Pennsylvania, and later attended the INIuncie high 
school. When he had completed his more specifically literaiy education he 
entered upon preparation for a professional career as a student in the Indiana 
Dental College, of Indianapolis, and was graduated with the class of 1903. 
Thus well equipped for his chosen calling he came to Indiana Harbor, opened 
his office, and has in the months which have since intervened secured a good 
patronage, w'hich is constantly increasing. 

Dr. Stephens was reared in the faith of the Methodist Episcopal church 
and is one of the members at Indiana Harbor. He belongs to tlie Delta 



654 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Sigma Delta, a dental fraternity, and he exercises his right of franchise in 
support of the men and measures of the Republican party. 

WILLIAM HALFMAN. 

William Halfman, promir.ent farmer and cigar manufacturer, residing 
on section 3, Ross township, is a nati\-c son of Lake count)- and has spent 
most of his life in busy pursuits within its liountlaries. He is a young man 
of progress and enterprise, has never lacked plenty to do and has made money 
from boyhood up, and has really only begun the career of activity which will 
result in greater successes in the future. 

Mr. Halfman was born May 18. 1875, on the farm where he still re- 
sides, in Ross township. Lake county. His father. Henry Halfman. was one 
of the old settlers of Lake county. William was reared and educated in Ross 
township, receiving his early educational training in the district schools. At 
the age of sixteen he left home and went to Cliicago, where for a time he 
was engaged in the milk business, was conductor on the street railway, and 
was also connected with the police force. He then returned to Lake county 
and began farming the old homestead, where he has since centered most of 
his energies. He does general farming, stock-raising and dairying and milk- 
shipping, and his place of over three hundred acres is one of the best in Lake 
countv, being a scene of business activity and industry from one end of the 
year to the other. For about two years, while still engaged in fanning, he 
traveled through Illinois, Wisconsin. Indiana and South Dakota as the sales- 
man for the McCormick and Champion farm machinery. In 1902 he began 
the manufacture of cigars, which he has made a very profitable enterprise. 
His most popular brand is the "Halfman's White Ribbon," a high-grade five- 
cent smoke. 

Mr. Halfman is one of the influential young Democrats of the county, 
and is at the present writing a candidate for the office of township trustee. 
He has always been interested in the public affairs and general welfare of his 
community, and can be depended upon for his due share of assistance and 
co-operation in all good works. 

Mr. Halfman married, in 1895, Miss Clara Klein, who was born in 
Grundy county, Illinois, a daughter of Henry J. and Clara Klein. They 
have three children : Clara, Edward and Marie. 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 655 

DR. SAMUEL A. BELL. 

Dr. Samuel A. Bell, a succes.sful and prominent member of the dental 
profession at Hammond, where he has been in practice ever since his gradu- 
ation from college, is a man of recognized ability and talent, not only in 
connection with his duties as a professional man, but in the larger realms 
of life, both business and social. He has concerned himself with, and con- 
sequently his time and energies have been called upon for many affairs per- 
taining to the general progress and development, and he has proved himself 
a thoroughly public-spirited and enterprising man. He is especially popular 
as a dentist, and has a large and high-class patronage, whose constantly re- 
curring needs make steady demands upon all his time. 

Dr. Bell was born in Kingston, Canada, October i8, 1868, being a son 
of John and Helen (McKechnie) Bell, natives, respectively, of England and 
Edinburg, Scotland. His mother was a daughter of William and Helen Mc- 
Kechnie. who came to America from Scotland. William IMcKechnie \\as a 
soldier in the English army during the war of 181J, arid by occupation was a 
general merchant in Canada. He died in Kingston, at the age of ninety-two, 
and his wife died when about sixty-five. They had seven children. John 
Bell, the paternal grandfather of Dr. Bell, was born in England, whence he 
moved to Canada, and was a farmer near Kingston the rest of his life, which 
came to an end when he was about eighty years of age. His wife Ellen also 
attained advanced years, and they were the parents of eight children. 

Dr. Bell's father was a farmer throughout the active period of his life, 
almost all of which has been spent in Canada, and he still resides at Kingston. 
In his earlier years he was a soldier in the English army, with the rank of 
lieutenant. He is a Methodist, as was his wife, whom death separated from 
him in February. 1901. when she was sixty-seven years old. They were 
the parents of ten children, seven of whom are still living, as follows : John 
A., of Watertown, New York; James H.. of Kingston, Canada; Senator 
Thomas E., of Hammond; Dr. Samuel A., of Hammond; Rose A., wife of 
Thomas Copely. of Kingston ; ]\Iaggie, widow of James Butland, of Kings- 
ton; and Nellie H., wife of Andrew McLean, of Kingston. 

Dr. Bell spent his youth on a Canadian farm, attending the district 
schools for his earlv education. He later entered the Ontario Veterinary 



656 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

College, where he was graduated in 1890. He did not make a permanent 
choice of the veterinarian profession, but on coming to the United States en- 
tered the dental department of the Northwestern University, of Chicago, 
graduating in 1894. He at once began his practice in Hammond, and has 
had ten most successful years of professional work in this city. He is a 
member of the Indiana State Dental Association. 

Dr. Bell affiliates with Garfield Lodge No. 569. F. & A. M.. and is 
treasurer of the lodge. He is also a member of the Knights of Pythias and 
Elks fraternities. In politics he is a stanch Republican. He is a member 
of the Hammond school board, and is president of the Indiana State Associa- 
tion of School Boards. His residence is at 366 South Hohman street, wdiere 
he built a good home in 1897. and besides this he owns other city real estate. 
He was married September 6. 1896. to Miss .\da Sanger, a daughter of 
Cvril and Carrie (Childres) Sanger. They have two children. Cyril and 
Walter. 

ELMER D. BRANDENBURG. 

Elmer D. Brandenburg, attorney at law, and in the real estate and in- 
surance business in Hammond, Indiana, belongs to the younger and pro- 
gressive element of the city and has gained quite a reputation and a prom- 
inent place among the members of the bar and the business men since identi- 
fvine himslf with Hammond. 

Mr. Brandenburg was born in Harrisburg, Ohio, October 13, 1871, 
being a son of John W. and Eliza J. (England) Brandenburg, the former 
a native of Kentucky and the latter of Ohio. His grandfather, Patterson C. 
Brandenburg, was born in the early days of Kentucky histon.-, and was a 
farmer, reaching the great age of ninety-eight years. His wife Elizabeth 
died young, and they had five sons and one daughter. 

John W. Brandenburg for a number of years operated a sawmill and a 
threshing outfit at Harrisburg, Ohio. He came to Indiana in 1881, locating 
at Winamac, where he lived until 1898, when he came to Hammond and is 
now in the employ of the Chicago Telephone Company. He was a soldier 
in the Civil war, serving three years as a private in Company F, Thirteenth 
Indiana Infantry, and was in the battle of Shiloh and other hard-fought bat- 
tles of that great struggle. He is not identified with any church, but his 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 657 

■wife is a ]Methodist. His witVs fatlier was David England, a native of Ohio, 
a soldier of the Ci\il w ar. and a farmer Ijy occupation. He died in Ohio at 
the age of sixty-three years, and his wife, who was Matilda Brown, died 
in Hammond, Indiana, in 1903, at the age of seventy-one. They had five 
sons and five daughters. John ^^^ and Eliza J. Brandenburg had four chil- 
dren : Eva, deceased: Elmer D. ; Lacy A., wife of John M. Kellar, of Ham- 
mond; and Oliver C, of Hammond. 

Elmer D. Brandenburg attended the public schools of Columbus, Ohio, 
and of Winamac, Indiana. He afterward entered the University of Indian- 
apolis, from which he graduated in 1898, having taken the law course, and 
was admitted to the bar the same year. He began his practice in Gas City, 
Grant county, and f<ir two years served as deputy prosecutor of that county. 
He located in Hammond in February, 1903, and ha? had a successful practice 
since that time. In connection with his brother Oliver, whose history is given 
below, h^ also conducts a real estate and insurance business. 

December 26, 1899, Mr. Brandenburg married Miss Josephine C. Balfe, 
a daughter of Colonel John C. and \'italis Balfe. Mrs. Brandenburg is a 
membi r of the Catholic church. ]\Ir. Brandenburg is a member of Gas City 
Lodge No. 428. K. of P.. being past chancellor. His political sentiments 
inclii e to the Republican party. He resides at 329 Sibley street, and he and 
his ife are numbered among the popidar members of Hammond society. 

OLIVER C. BRANDENBURG. 

Oliver C. Brandenburg, of the firm of Brandenburg Brothers, real 
estate and insurance, in the First National Bank building, at Hammond, has 
found a profitable and useful niche in the liusiness world, and has already 
proved himself a public-spirited and progressive citizen during his brief con- 
nection with business affairs in Hammond. 

He was torn at Harrisburg, Ohio, March 29, 1876, being the youngest 
of the four children of John W. and Eliza J. (England) Brandenburg, who 
are both living in Hammond. The further family history is given above in 
the biography of Mr. Brandenburg's brother. 

Oliver C. Brandenlvurg was nine years old when his parents came from 
Ohio to Indiana, and he attended the public schools of Winamac, where he 
was reared to manhood. He entered the Central Normal College at Danville 

42 



658 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

about 1892, and after finishing his course there engaged in teaching for six 
terms. He came to Hammond in 1899 and taught liere for two terms, and 
then took up the real estate and insurance business in Gas City, Indiana. In 
December, 1902, he returned to Hammond, and a short time later the firm 
of Brandenburg Brothers was formed, which has carried on a very profitable 
business in real estate and insurance ever since. 

September 26, 1900, Mr. Brantlenburg married Miss Lillie May Conn. 
n daughter of William and Eliza Jane (Cinder) Conn. They have one 
daughter, Mable Winona Brandenburg. Mrs. Brandenburg is a member of 
the Methodist church. He affiliates with Monterey Lodge No. 660, I. O. O. 
F., and with the Fraternal Assurance Society of America. In politics he is 
a Republican. His home is at 49 Sibley street. 

DR. CYRUS W. CAMPBELL. 

Dr. Cyrus W. Campbell, physician and surgeon with offices in th.e Ma- 
jestic building at Hammond, Indiana, has carried on a successful practice 
in this city for thirteen years, and is one of the progressive and skillful prac- 
titioners of Lake county. He has been devoted to his professional duties, 
and still takes a studious interest in all that concerns medical science. His 
twenty years of experience has given him well deserved prestige among his 
fellow physicians, and the patronage which he receives in Hammond and sur- 
rounding country is evidence of his standing in the profession. 

Dr. Campbell was born in Monterey, Indiana, October 15, 1850, being 
a son of Francis G. and Delia (Campbell) Campbell, natives, respectively, 
of Ohio and New York. His paternal grandfather, Dugall Campbell, was a 
native of Ohio, of Scotch descent, a farmer, and was married three times, 
having a large family. The maternal grandfather of Dr. Campbell was a 
native of New York state, and had three children. Francis G. Campbell was a 
printer by trade, and in 1846 moved west and located in Monterey, Indiana, 
where he carried on real estate and merchandising business and also farm- 
ing, and where he died in 1878, at the age of fifty-six years, being the in- 
cumbent of the office of county commissioner at the time. His wife had died 
four years previously, aged fifty-four. She was a meniljer of the Methodist 
church. Thev had five children, four sons and one daughter : Elizabeth, the 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 659 

wife of H. S. Fausler. of Monterey, Indiana: Hiram F., of Hammond; Cyrus 
W. ; William A., of Alger, Ohio; and Eli L., of Cotulla, Texas. 

Dr. Campbell was reared on a farm near Monterey, Indiana, and had the 
benefit of the district schools. In 1879 he entered the Medical College of In- 
diana at Indianapolis, and after completing the course l>egan practicing in 
Blue Grass, Fulton county, Indiana, where he remained until 1891, and in the 
spring of that year located in Hammond, which has Ijeen the seat of his suc- 
cessful practice to the present time. 

October 30, 1873, Dr. Campbell married Miss Ellen Wallace, a daughter 
of James and Margaret (Balx:ock) Wallace. Seven children have been born 
to them. Margaret, Clarence, Ethel, Claudius, Fay, Murley and Dean. Clar- 
ence died at the age of thirteen months. Ethel married Frank Stakemiller, 
of Hammond, and they ha\e two children. Donald and Ellen. Claudius is 
in the employ of the Hammond Company, being foreman of the casing de- 
partment; he married Frances Kizer, and they have one son, Cyrus. The 
family are Baptists in religion. Dr. Campbell affiliates with the Knights of 
Pythias and the Maccaljees, and is a member of the Kankakee Valley Medi- 
cal Association. He is a Republican in politics, and is secretary of the board 
of health of Hammond. He owns his nice home at 326 Truman avenue, 
where the family extend an open-hearted hospitality to their many friends. 

DR. L. D. JACKSON. 

Dr. Lorenzo D. Jackson, physician and surgeon at Hammond, has been 
engaged in acti\-e practice in this city for nearly fifteen years, and in this 
useful profession has attained considerable distinction both in Hammond and 
the surrounding country. He is not only an able and sympathetic practi- 
tioner, but is also a man of broad experience and capacity in other lines of 
work. He had been successfully engaged in various activities and kinds of 
business before taking up the practice of medicine, and his life has been spent 
in dilYerent parts of the country. He is an active, public-spirited citizen, and 
is held in high esteem by his many friends and business associates. 

Dr. Jackson was born in W^ayne county, Indiana, January 15, 1849, ^ 
son of Joseph and Mary E. (Harvey) Jackson, natives of Virginia and In- 
diana, respectively. Mrs. Mary E. Jackson was a daughter of William 
Harvey, who was born in North Carolina, and became a pioneer settler of 



660 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Wayne county. Indiana, where he took up government land an.tl liecame a 
thriftv and prosperous farmer. He and his wife li\ed to advanced years, 
and were the parents of five cliildren. He was of Welsh descent. 

Caleb Jackson, the paternal grandfather of Dr. Jackson, w-as a native of 
Virginia, and a descendant of English ancestors who had come from the north 
of Ireland and settled in Virginia. He grew to manhood in that state, and 
in the early days of the last century he came direct from the Old Dominion 
• state to Wayne county, Indiana, where he figured as one of the ])rominent 
pioneer settlers and where he spent the remainder of his long and useful 
life. He took up government land, on which he reared his six children. He 
was foremost in the promotion of railroad building in those days. He had 
the contract for building the Pennsylvania road through Wayne county, and 
was afterward for a number of years a director in that railroad company. 

Joseph Jackson, the father of Dr. Jackson, was about eight years old 
when he came west with his parents to Wayne county, where he grew to 
manhood and spent the remainder of his life, his occupation being farming. 
He lived to be seventy-six years old, and his wife died at the age of fifty-six. 
Thev were brought up in the faith of the Friends, but she later joined the 
Christian church. They were the parents of thirteen children, all of whom 
are living, as follows: Rebecca J., the wife of William O. Elliott, of Sterling, 
Kansas: John W., of Cambridge City, Indiana: 01i^■e, wife of John Cod- 
dington, of Wayne county, Indiana: Salina J., w'idow of Lemuel Morgan, of 
Indianapolis; Caleb B., of Wayne county; Joseph \\'., of Lebanon, Ohio; 
Lorenzo D., of Hammond; Lafayette, of Wayne county; Columbus, of La 
(irange, Indiana; ^lary E., wife of Nathan Ray, of Sterling, Kansas; Charles, 
of Wayne county; Sarah, wife of George McConaha. of \\'ayne county: and 
Lincoln, of Arkansas City, Kansas. 

Dr. Jackson spent his youth in the environments of country and farm 
life. After completing the district school course he entered Earlham College, 
in Wayne county, and later taught school for two terms. He then went out 
west to California and Nevada, where he was engaged, principally, in milling 
quartz for the miners. After four years spent in the west he returned to 
Wayne county, and for a time devoted his efforts to farming. He then l>e- 
gan the study of medicine in the Physio-Medical College at Indianapolis, 
from which he was graduated in 1889. For about a year he practiced in 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 601 

Rensselaer, Jasper county, but in 1890 opened his olfice in Hammond, where 
he has carried on his practice ever since. 

Dr. Jackson is a member of Cahimet Lodge No. 601, L O. O. F.. and his 
poHtical cleavage is Republican. He married Miss ]\Iary E. Blease, a daugh- 
ter of James and Hannah Blease. They had three children, Eva, John and 
Sarah, but John died in infancy. Mrs. Jackson is also a physician and sur- 
geon. Ijeing a graduate of the Physio-Medical College, and she also has an 
extensive practice in Hammond. 

OSCAR A. KRINBILL. 

Oscar A. Krinbill. manager of the Chicago Telephone Companv and 
commissioner of Lake county, at Hammond, with residence at 25 Rimbach 
avenue, is one of the successful business men of long standing in this city, 
and has made his home in Lake county all his life, with the exception of two 
years spent in Kansas. He was known for many years as the leading drug- 
gist of Hammond, but has recently withdrawn from purely commercial pur- 
suits and devoted himself to the management of his other business matters. 
He is a popular citizen of both Hammond and Lake county, as he deserves 
from his life-long identification with their interests, and he has to his credit 
many public-spirited endeavors undertaken for the promotion of the welfare 
and upbuilding of city and county. 

Mr. Krinbill was born in Crow^n Point, Lake county. August 3, 1863, 
being a son of George and Marie (Arnold) Krinbill, natives of Pennsyl- 
vania, the latter one of two sons and two daughters of a native German who 
came to America and settled in Pennsylvania. The father of George Krin- 
bill was a life-long resident of Pennsylvania, and was the father of six sons. 
George Krinbill was engaged in merchandising for many years, and later was 
a farmer. He is an old settler of Licliana. having come to this state in 185 1 
and settled at Cedar Lake, and later at Crown Point, his present home. He 
has lived in Lake county for fifty-two years. He and his wife are Methodists. 
They were the parents of eight children, four sons and four daughters, and 
six are living at the present time: George Edward, of Dixon, Illinois; Julia, 
a teacher in the schools of Minneapolis : Daniel W., of Rochester, New York ; 
Albert, deceased: Lena, of Crown Point: Oscar A., of Hammond: Sarah, de- 
ceased: and Lillian M., a teacher in the kindergarten department of the pul)- 
lic schools of Princeton. Illinois. 



662 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Mr. Oscar A. Krinbill was reared at Crown Point, and attended the 
public schools of that jilace. He studied pharmacy, and was engaged in 
the practical work of that profession for seventeen years. He came to Ham- 
mond, February 14, 1886, and for the first seven years was a drug clerk and 
for the past ten years conducted a drug store of his own, until he retired from 
the business in 1903. On September 21, 1903, he became manager of the 
Chicago Telephone Company, and is performing the duties of that responsible 
position at the present time. 

June 15, 1893. Mr. Krinbill married Miss Edith \\'eaver, a daughter 
of Edward and Anna (Randolph) Weaver. One daughter has been torn 
to them, Josephine M. Mrs. Krinbill is a member of the Presbyterian church 
and he belongs to Garfield Lodge No. 569, F. & A. M., Hammond Chapter, 
R. A. M., and Hammond Commander}' No. 41, K. T., and is also affiliated 
with the Knights of Pythias. In politics he is a stanch Republican. He 
was appointed county commissioner on January i, 1903, to fill out the 
vacancy of Stephen Ripley, and he was on the Hammond board of educa- 
tion for five years. In 1898 he built his nice home at 25 Rimbach avenue, 
and he also owns two other good residence properties. 

PETER CRUMPACKER. 

Peter Crumpacker, one of the leading lawyers of Hammond, Indiana, 
and a member of the firm of Crumpacker and ]Moran, belongs to an old and 
prominent family, it having been represented in ^Maryland prior to the Revo- 
lutionary war, but later moved to Virginia. In the Old Dominion the 
paternal grandfather. Owen Crumpacker. had his nativity, and he was of 
German descent. \\'hile a resident of his native commonwealth he was a 
farmer and after coming to Indiana, in 1828, he continued that as his life 
occupation, and his death occurred when about sixty-five years of age. His 
wife Hannah reached the ripe old age of eighty-six years, and loecame the 
mother of six children. On the maternal side Mr. Crumpacker is de- 
scended from the Emmons family, of Scotch-Irish descent, who made their 
homes in the same section of Virginia as the Crumpackers. In 1832 his 
grandfather removed from that state to Cass county, ^Michigan, where his 
life's labors were ended in death at the age of sixty-eight years, while his 
wife Elsie survi\-cd him to the age of eighty-one years. In their family 
were three sons and tln-ee daughters. 




c:^:2;^.-^y^?^v 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 663 

Peter Crumpncker was born in LaPorte county, Indiana, on the 9th of 
August, 1858, being a son of Theophilus and Harriet (Emmons) Crum- 
packer, natives of old Virginia. Eight children were born to this worthy 
couple, six sons and two daughters, but only seven are now living : John W., 
cashier of the Savings Bank of LaPorte; Hon. Edgar D., the present con- 
gressman from the tenth Indiana district and a resident of Valparaiso; 
Daniel W., of Willow Springs, Illinois, in the railway mail service; Eliza A., 
who became the v.ife of Melvin W. Lewis, but Iioth liave passed away; 
Peter, of Hammond; Dora A., the wife of Iredell Luther, of Chicago; 
Charles, who is employed as a traveling salesman and maintains his home 
in Valparaiso ; and Grant, a lawyer of that city. Theophilus Crumpacker. 
the father of tltis family, accompanied his parents on their removal to 
Indiana in 1829, during his boyhood, their first location being in Union 
county. In 1832 they became residents of Porter county, this state, there 
spending one year, after which Mr. Theophilus Crumpacker removed to 
LaPorte county, that continuing as his home until the fall of 1863. From 
that time until 1865 he resided near Kankakee, Illinois, on the expiration of 
which period he returned to Porter county, locating on a farm three miles 
east of Valparaiso. Throughout his active business career he followed agri- 
cultural pursuits, Iiut in 1890 he retired from the farm and has since made 
his home in \^alparaiso, having now reached the eighty-second milestone on 
the journey of life. His wife is also in her eighty-second year, and although 
not members of any religious denomination this worthy old couple are 
adherents of the Christian faith. Mr. Crumpacker has always taken an 
active part in public affairs, and for three terms represented his district in 
the legislature, while he has also served as a tow-nship trustee, and has but 
recently retired from the city council of Valparaiso, of which he was a 
member for many years. 

Peter Crumpacker, the fifth child of this honored Indiana pioneer, spent 
the greater part of his bojdiood days in Porter county, remaining on the 
homestead farm until twenty-three years of age, during which time he 
acquired his education in the district schools and in the Valparaiso Normal 
School. For eight terms thereafter he was employed as a teacher in the 
country schools, also assisting his father witli the work of the farm during 
tlie summer months and for a period of nearly three years was the deputy 



664 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

county clerk under John Felton in Porter county. He then spent a year 
and a half in completing a general index of all judsrments that had been 
taken in Porter county, placing them in alphabetical order for ready refer- 
ence. These duties completed, Mr. Crumpacker began reading law with 
his brother Edgar at Valparaiso, later taking a one-year course at the North- 
ern Indiana Law School, in which he graduated in June, 1887, ^"^ ^^'^^ 
immediately thereafter admitted to the bar. In 1888 he began the practice 
of his chosen profession in Hammond, Indiana, locating in this city on the 
5th of March of that year. As a lawyer he is conspicuous among his asso- 
ciates, not alone on account of the success he has achieved, but by reason of 
his strong intellectuality, and his influence extends not only into the profes- 
sional but the political and social circles as well. 

In March. 1883, Mr. Crumpacker was united in marriage to ]\Iiss Ida M. 
Younglove, a daughter of Wilbur and Maiy E. (Hurr) Younglove. of 
Valparaiso. Indiana.- Si.x children have Iieen born of this union, three sons 
and three daughters, — Harriet ]\I.. Robert. Theophilus Charles. Mary A., 
Edgar D. and Dorothy. — but two of the number. Robert and Mary A., died 
in infancy. ]\Irs. Crumpacker is a member of the Christian church. In liis 
fraternal relations Mr. Crumpacker affiliates with Garfield Lodge No. 569, 
F. & A. M., of Hammond: with Crown Point Chapter, R. A. M. ; with the 
Independent Order of Foresters : and with the Benevolent and Protective 
Order of Elks, of Hammond. His political support is given to the Repub- 
lican party, and as its representati\e he served as the city attorney for 
four years. 

REV. FRANCIS XAVIER EGE. 

In the history of the new world the Catholic clergy, in its \-arious orders, 
have performed the work of religious, and often industrial, pioneers — ac- 
companying closely the traders and agricultural settlers, and keeping up with 
the very vanguard of civilization as it pushed out from the eastern coast and 
spread over the western prairies. These men have justly obtained wide recog- 
nition for their indefatigable energy, their unfailing patience and endurance, 
and their sincere and zealous devotion to the cause which they represented. 
In whate\'er vineyard they ha\e worked they have assisted in the industrial 
progress, and have been especially powerful factors in advancing education 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 665 

and building up the other beneficent institutions which are the mainstay of 
social order and permanence. 

Father Ege, the well known priest of northern Indiana, where he has 
labored for a cjuarter of a century, and who is now the beloved priest in St. 
Anthony's parish in Hanover township of this county, is a representative of 
the highest type of the Catholic priesthood — zealous and hard-working, pos- 
sessed of broad and beneficent purposes, of sweet and generous character, 
and a man revered for his work and worth wherever and among whatso- 
ever people the duties of the Master place him. 

Father Ege is a native of Wiirtemberg, Germany, where he was born in 
1849, being a son of Xavier and Mary Ann (Steinhauser) Ege. His studious 
nature manifesting itself in childhood, he determined to educate himself for 
the priesthood, and accordingly from the age of fourteen to twenty-one he 
was a student in his native province. After the priman,- schooling he entered 
ihe gymnasium at Felkirk, Austria, where he continued his scholastic career 
until he was twenty-one years of age. The war l>etween Germany and Aus- 
tria at that time threatened to interfere seriously with his plans, and it was 
on this account mainly that he concluded to come to America. The reputation 
of the thorough curriculum of study in philosophy and theology offered by 
the famous St. Xavier De Sales Saiesium at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, was al- 
ready familiar to him, and after arriving in this country he entered this in- 
stitution in 1869, and after a seven years' course which fitted him for the 
priesthood he graduated in 1876. On June 10, 1876, he was ordained priest 
at Fort Wayne, Indiana (the seat of the Northern Bishopric of Indiana), 
by Bishop DAvenger. 

His first parish was at Earl Park. Benton county. Indiana, where he 
remained until 1878. and where he was instrumental in the erection of the 
priest's home, and although he found the parish encumbered by a debt of 
eight hundred dollars he left the church entirely free from money obliga- 
tions. There were in this parish some eighty French families, forty German 
and forty Irish, and since that time there have been erected two additional 
churches so as to make one for each nationality. The next field of labor for 
Father Ege was in southeastern Noble county, Indiana. This parish then lay 
in almost a wilderness, surrounded lay the virgin forest. There was no pat- 
ron saint's name given to the parish, it was simply known as the "French 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

settlement." A new frame Gothic church had been built in 1875, and there 
were seventy-five or eight)^ poor families in the parish, and the property 
was encumbered with three thousand dollars" indebtedness. Hardly two 
months had passed before the energizing labor of Father Ege had estab- 
lished a parochial school and placed over it a male instructor, who was 
later superseded by two Sisters of St. Francis, one the teacher and the otiier 
the cook, and these latter have remained in charge since ]\Iarch, 1879, al- 
though an additional teacher has since been given the school. Due to Father 
Ege's managements and industry also, the debt of this parish was canceled. 
In 1886 this parish, known as St. Mary's, met with a dire calamity, the priest's 
home, the sisters' home and the school being all destroyed by fire, and the 
Father saved nothing, his extensive and beloved library and even his cloth- 
ing being consumed. But there was no evidence of despair, no time was lost 
in useless lamentation, and in a short time Father Ege had the pleasure of see- 
ing arise, phoenix-like, one of the most beautiful and attractive brick school 
buildings to be found in the diocese, built at a cost of twenty-two hundred 
dollars, and paid for before it was finished. Also there was erected a two- 
story brick residence for the sisters, and a priest's home of brick costing 
twenty-one hundred dollars and all were paid for at the time of completion. 
He also caused to be constructed an ornamental iron fence around the en- 
tire premises, and beautiful shade trees were planted to adorn the grounds. 
He remained in this parish altogether for nineteen years. During this period 
he at first experienced considerable trouble in getting his mail, and he ac- 
cordingly appealed to the United States government, which established a post- 
office in his parish and named it Ege in his honor, this being done in 1884. 
After this long siege of trouble and care his health was greatly impaired 
and he was forced to enter one of the leading hospitals in Chicago, where he 
remained six months. Even then he was not restored to his normal capa- 
bility, and under the advice of the good Bishop Durnger he spent about seven 
months traveling in the extreme south, southwest, and western parts of the 
United States and also in British Columbia. He visited much of the grand 
sublime mountain scenery of the great west, drinking in its inspiration and 
exhilaration, and so much was he impressed by the splendors of nature that 
he considers the Swiss or Tyrolese Alps so famed in continental Europe to be 
inferior in many respects to the vast ranges of our own west. In the mean- 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 067 

time his normal health returned, and in August, 1898, he was able to assume 
charge of St. Anthony's parish in Hanover township. Lake county, where he 
has since been the Iseloved priest. He has kept the parish property in splendid 
repair, and there is not a dollar's indebtedness. There are thirty-five families 
in the parish, and all are in prosperous circumstances. 

While pastor of St. Mary's in Noble county, Father Ege had a mission 
at Albion, the county seat, where there were fifteen families with an excellent 
church. After he had been there some time the Father was informed that a 
debt of six hundred dollars stood against the property. This circumstance 
troubled him. and one Sabbath he informed his congregation of the state of 
afifairs and made a business proposition which was at once accepted, and on 
the very next day the entire amount of six hundred dollars was paid to one 
of the Albion banks. Father Ege always remembers with extreme gratitude 
the great kindness and substantial material aid given him by the Protestant 
people during his misfortune in losing his home and other church property 
while in Noble county. Father Ege is a devout man, a good citizen, and is 
held in the highest esteem by all regardless of differences of religious creed. 
He is in every way fitted for his work as a leader of men, and it is a pleasure 
to be able to record the principal events of his beneficent career in this took of 
Lake county history. 

A LIFE OUTLINE. 

T. H. Ball, recognized as the historian of Lake county, Indiana, has 
had quite an eventful life, the full details of which would make more than 
a small volume. A comparatively brief outline is all that can here be given. 

Birthplace, Ahwic, Lineage. 

He was born February 16, 1826, at the home of Dr. Timothy Horton, 
his mother's father, in tlie present town of Agawam, then West Springfield, 
Massachusetts. At this date only about six weeks of the second quarter of 
the grand nineteenth century had passed, and in a few months from this 
date took place the fiftieth anniversary of the birth of this nation and the 
death of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. Only one president had died 
before he was born. John Ouincy Adams was then president. It was a 
favorable period in which to begin life, and some very pleasant circum- 



668 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

stances were around him. Througli liis fatlier, at that time a lawyer in the 
state of Georgia, near Augusta, he is tlie seventh in descent from Francis 
Ball, of \\'est Springfield, who was, according to the late researches of the 
Ball International Union, one of six brothers who came from England 
between 1630 and 1650. Through his mother he is a descendant of the 
Hortons from England, a great-grandson of Dr. Timothy Horton, Sr., who 
was born in Springfield or West Springfield in 1726, and probably the seventh 
in descent from Thomas Horton, of Springfield, a settler in 1638. Also 
through his mother, Jane Ayrault (Aro) Horton, and his grandmother, 
Eli.zabeth Hanmer, daughter of James Hanmer, he is a descendant of the 
English Hanmers. an early branch of which family settled in Connecticut; 
and through his great-grandmother, Elizabeth Ayrault, of W'ethersfield, he 
is a descendant of Dr. Nicholas Ayrault. a Huguenot refugee of about 1681, 
who settled in Rhode Island and married Marian or Mary Ann Breton, 
daughter of a prosperous Huguenot merchant of the south of France, so 
that through these, from whom he is the sixth in descent, he goes back to a 
line of Huguenots who were in good circumstances in life, who possessed 
physical endurance, and who clung tenaciously to their religious faith. 
Perhaps some of that tenacity came down, Ijy what is now called a law of 
heredity, to their Indiana descendant, for Dr. Higgins, of Crown Point, once 
remarked of him that he had a bull-dog tenacity of purpose. Going back 
now to his grandmother Ball, who was a daughter of John Miller and 
Hepzibah Chapin, he is the eighth in descent from Deacon Samuel Chapin, 
an early settler in Springfield, a noted man in Puritan church life, a man 
highly esteemed, who in 1652 was "appointed one of the magistrates of 
Springfield." It thus appears that the child Ixirn in Agawam in 1826 had 
four w ell established lines of Puritan and English ancestry — the Ball. Horton, 
Hanmer and Chapin lines — and one well-known Huguenot line, so that he 
would now be quite inexcusable not to have some strong principle. The 
name given to that child was Timothy Horton, the name of his grandfather, 
a quite noted physician at that time in West Springfield. The name being 
rather long, Timothy Horton Ball, he has become accustomed to write it as 
his ordinary and business signature, T. H. Ball, using as a signature to many 
of his writings the initials T. H. B., and .sometimes the finals Y. N. L. He 
learned a few years ago that there was and perhaps is still another T. H. Ball 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 669 

in this cDuntry wlio was a corset-maker, Init he is very sure that no one 
else in this entire country can claim the ad(h"ess Rev. T. H. Ball. 

Different Home Spots. 

From his grandfather's home in Agawam the young T. H. Ball went 
with his mother, in the fall of 1828, to his father's home in Columbia county, 
Georgia, but of that ocean voyage frotn New York to Savannah he retains 
no remembrance, his memory reaching back onlv to himself, his mother, 
his father, the black servants, and the surroundings of his father's home, in 
a newly erected house at the county seat of Columbia county. Here he re- 
mained, learning as a boy naturally would, one form of life in the south, the 
native scenery of that part of the south, its social and its religious life as he 
saw this life, till tlie late fall of 1833, when he was nearly eight years of 
age. and then he returned with his iiKither and a sister and a brother, also 
with his father, to the town of West Springfield and to his birthplace. 
There, in looking on the walls of the ancestral home, an object attracting his 
attention immediately was a painting representing the Horton and Hanmer 
coats of arms. Whether his English ancestors were really of the families 
to whom these were originally given he knew not then, he knows not now, 
but these armorial representations, lions couchant and rampant, had quite 
an influence upon him. 

From the fall of 1833 to the spring of 1837 he learned New England 
life and customs and traditions, as fast as he could grasp thein, learned 
something of the kindred of his father and his mother, and in 1837 the 
family, then increased by the addition of two Massachusetts brothers, came 
to Indiana. For a little while in the summer and fall a home was found 
in the new village of City West, on the shore of Lake Michigan, ten miles 
west from Michigan City. Here he learned the meaning of frontier life, 
learned the grandeur of Lake Michigan in storms and its beauty in repose, 
gained from the tops of the great sand hills an idea of the solitudes of 
nature, and saw something of Indian life. But he made visits with his 
father to the prairie region of Lake county in mid-summer, and to that 
beautiful little lake, the Lake of the Red Cedars, where for the next thirtv 
years the home of the Ball family was to be, and where in December of 
1837 the entire family was comfortably domiciled. To this home of lake and 



670 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

prairie beauty his grandmother from New York city soon came and two 
httle Cedar Lake sisters, hke prairie liirds, also came, making in ah. without 
the domestics, usually two or tliree in number, ten members of the trans- 
planted New England family. This became the dear home spot, the dearest 
at length to him of all home spots of earth, where he learned something of 
farm work, of raising cattle and sheep and hogs, and learned to hunt, and 
to spear fish, and to swim, and to pole and row and scull a boat, and where 
the most important experiences and events of his life took place. 

One more home spot remains to be named. Crown Point, where he 
established his own home in 1863, and where that home continues to be. 
Lito the Crown Point home at different times many friends and some kindred 
have gathered, and within its peaceful walls a daughter has been married, a 
little niece has died, and a grandson has been torn. 

His Mental Training. 

Of course many ideas had been acquired and quite a little mental train- 
ing had been carried on by his mother in his first two years of life of which 
he has no remembrance. He had learned in those years one great lesson, 
and that was obedience. Of learning to read in his Georgia home he has 
no distinct recollection. His father, a graduate of Middlebury College, and 
estimating highly the value of classical studies, had him commence the study 
of Latin so soon as he could read well and had learned from his mother some- 
thing of elementary geography and arithmetic and lx)tany. He commenced 
attending an academy. He had some good teachers, all of them men. He 
went over the usual spelling and reading lessons of the other pupils but 
applied himself diligently to his Latin studies. The only certainty as to 
age at this time is this, that he had committed to memory very largely 
Adams' Latin grammar, had read a Latin first reader then used called Liber 
Primus, had read a second book called Viri Roinae, and in the fall of 1833 
commenced reading in Caesar's Commentaries, when his southern academic 
life ended. 

In West Springfield, when eight years of age, in an academic school 
he continued to read the writings of Caesar. When nine years of age he 
commenced the study of Greek and continued this with his other studies for 
two years, having for a portion of this time a private tutor for his Greek. 



• HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 671 

The year 1837 came and classical studies were laid by. At the Cedar Lake 
home school he pursued English studies as a kind of recreation, applied 
himself vigorously to arithmetic, surveying and philosophy, doing quite an 
amount of reading along with some farm work and hunting. He had com- 
menced in Georgia reading poetry, having in his own library "Original 
Poems for Infant Minds" and Cowper's works, three volumes. To these 
were added in Agawam "The Poetical Works of Hemans, Heber and Pol- 
lok," and in his lake home there came into his hands "Ossian," of which he 
became intensely fond. Several of the British poets naturally followed in 
his youth except Shakespeare, for whose writings he never formed a taste. 
In West Springfield he attended when nine years of age a literarj' society 
and acquired there a taste for literary pursuits which was further cultivated 
by the Cedar Lake Lyceum and the Cedar Lake Belles Lettres Society, which 
taste has never left him. 

The time at length came for him to lay aside farm work and hunting and 
prepare in earnest for college life. Classical studies were resumed in the 
home at the lake. He read largely and rapidly Caesar and Cicero's orations 
and Virgil, reading the twelve books of the Aeneid, the Bucolics, and the 
Georgics. reading the last Georgia, 566 lines, in one June day. 

Entering Franklin College, Indiana, in 1848, a long ways "in advance" 
of the regular college course, he graduated in 1850, received the degree of 
Bachelor of Arts and soon commenced teaching, first, taking charge of the 
Hendricks County Seminary at Danville, Indiana, and in 185 1 becoming 
principal of the Grove Hill Male and Female Academy of Clarke county. 
Alabama. Here, as a teacher, he applied himself diligently to the studv of 
English grammar and in a short time, with a few years of teaching, he 
considered himself well skilled in the three departments of parsing, so-called, 
of analyzing, and of scanning. In college he had given much attention to 
the odes of Horace, and he soon found English prosody very attractive. In 
three years from the time of his graduation he received the degree "in 
course" of Master of Arts. 

The time came for another change in studies. In i860 he entered as a 
student the Xewton Theological Institution near Boston, and there spent 
three years in close study, having as teachers Dr. H. B. Hackett, Dr. Alvah 
Hovey, and Dr. A. S. Train. He graduated in 1863 and has been cultivating 
his mental powers ever since. 



672 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

Special Statements. 

He was received as a member into tlie Cedar Lake Baptist church April 
19, 1845. a"<^' o" the next day, Sunday, April jo, was baptized according to 
Baptist custom in the waters of the Red Cedar Lake, on the same day with 
his oldest sister. He was licensed to preach, also according to Baptist usage, 
February 8, 185 1, at Danville, Indiana. He went to Clarke county. Alabama, 
in 1851, and was there married, April 19, 1855, to Martha Caroline Creigh- 
ton, daughter of Rev. Hiram Creighton, of Clarke county, with whom he has 
now lived for nearly fifty years, and who has nobly filled all the positions 
which have come to her in life. 

He was ordained at Crown Point Decemlier 30. 1853. He went south 
in 1858 and remained there till the fall of i860. He settled as pastor at 
Crown Point in 1863. In 1865 he established the Crown Point Institute, 
and erected a good, substantial building, and secured several teachers. 
August I, 1871, he sold the land and building to the town of Crown Point 
for public school purposes, receiving the sum of $3,600. 

As Pttblishcr. 

He issued his first publication, a ijamijhlet on the Immortality of the 
Soul, in 1861, at Boston, and his first book in 1873, at Crown Point. His 
largest book, "Clarke and Its Surroundings," pages 774, was published at 
Grove Hill, Alabama, in 1882. In all he has published thirteen books and 
six pamphlets, historical, poetical, genealogical, and religious, nearly all sent 
out from Crown Point. 

In all, thousands of copies have gone into ])ublic and private liliraries, 
and he has ])aid out thousands of dollars fcir printing and binding. Most 
of these ])ublications have brought in some income. LTnlike general and 
large publishers he has issued only his own writings, being at the same time 
author and pulilisher. Besides books and pamphlets, he has also published 
maps, his own maps, and these have been a source of a more considerable 
income. He also published, at different times, three periodicals, the Casta- 
llon, the Prairie Voi-ce, and Our Banner, the latter being for a time the organ 
of the Indiana State Sunday School Union. 

In his younger days, before commencing to publish books, he wrote 



HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 673 

quite frequently fi)i" large religious papers, the Journal and Messenger, tlie 
Southzvesleni Baplisf. tlie Te/utessee Baptist, the IJ'itiiess, the C/irisfiaii 
Times, now the Standard, antl for some secular papers. 

Concluding Statements. 

The three departments of iiis hfe work have been teaching, writing, 
and preaching, tlie latter including much Sunday-school work. In these 
lines of work and including his childhood travels, he has made fourteen 
journeys from Massachusetts or Indiana to Georgia and Alabama, passing 
from north to south and from south to north twenty-eight times, taking some- 
times the Atlantic Ocean and coast route, being once east of the Gulf stream 
and among a school of whales, sometimes passing through Kentucky and 
Tennessee, and sometimes .going up and down the Mississippi river; tra\-el- 
ling in the old stage coaches, on sailing vessels, on a canal boat, on lake and 
river steamers, as well as on railway cars, on horseback and on foot. He 
has been in Montreal and on the Gulf of Mexico and in nearly every state 
east of the Mississippi. 

His first teaching" was in the winter of 1843, sixty years ago, in a 
public school of Lake county, on the east side of Cedar Lake, and there is 
quite certainly no man now li\'ing who was a teacher in Lake county so 
long ago. 

He had charge for some years of the Crown Point Institute, taught 
the first normal school in the county, and gathered up from various sources 
for its first publication the county history. In acti\'e Sunday-school work 
there is room to say only this, that liesides work as a missionary of the 
American Sunday School L^nion for several years, he was for twenty-two 
years secretary of the County S. S. Convention. As a missionary pastor, 
the only minister of the gospel for several years of his denomination in the 
county, commencing his labors fully as such January i, 1856, he has preached 
in all the central and southern parts of the county, in churches and school- 
houses, and has conducted burial services at twenty-two cemeteries in the 
county, also at Salem and in the Hebron cemetery in Porter county. This 
record extends from 1853 to 1904, over a period of fifty years. 

Hon. Bartlett Woods is reported to have remarked that Mr. Ball had 
carried the gospel to more people in Lake county than any other minister 
ever did or ever would. 
43 



674 HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY. 

His disappointments, trials, sorrows, whicii. if few. have not been small, 
are not to be given in this outline. 

His blessings and successes of various kinds have been neither few 
nor small. Among these he counts the homes of his childhood and youth ; 
well educated, cultivated, and judicious Christian parents; three manly and 
kind brothers and three affectionate, culti\ated sisters; and more than that 
oft-quoted number of dear "five Imndred" friends, for he has certainly l)een 
as a visitor, a tourist, a Sunday-school missionary, a gospel minister, in more 
than -a thousand homes in Xew Hampshire, Vermont, and Massachusetts ; 
in Indiana and Illinois; in Kentucky and Tennessee; in Georgia, Alabama, 
and Mississippi, and he has seldom failed in every home to gain a friend. 
Among other great blessings he counts tiie Alabama maiden \\ho Ijecame 
his wife, his .son antl daughter and other kindred dear. 

Successful in several particulars for which he is very grateful, he hopes 
yet to accomplish something more in life. 

He has earned something in teaching and !)}• means of his publications. 
Something of an amount of money has passed through his hands, seldom 
more than two thousand dollars in a year, dribblets compared with what 
many receive and spend, and he has nothing laid by for helpless old age if 
that should ever come upon him. He yet has two of the great blessings of 
life, good eyesight and good health. 



